Rail Transport

Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:35 pm on 21 March 2023.

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Photo of Jane Dodds Jane Dodds Liberal Democrat 1:35, 21 March 2023

Good afternoon, First Minister. I'm calling it the great Wales train robbery—that's what the Westminster Government are doing to Wales by claiming yet again, and you've referred to this, that HS2 is an England-and-Wales project, which actually means that Wales will lose £5 billion-worth of funding. And then, to add insult to injury, last week's announcement that the Northern Powerhouse rail will be classified as an England-and-Wales project, without a metre of track being in Wales, means that we lose a further £1 billion-worth of funding for our transport system. For a fraction of that, here in Wales, we could actually make free public transport available, not just to under-25s, but actually to the whole of the population. And this is on top of decades, as you said, First Minister, of underinvestment in rail. I do want to think constructively, though, and I hope that, in your role and your relationship, I hope, with Keir Starmer, and given that there will probably be a UK Labour Government next in power, would you restore this lost funding to Wales, or, given the recent comments by Keir Starmer, has that train already left the station? Diolch.