00:00My question to you today is simple. Is this true? And if it is true, why did you ask for nothing, literally nothing at all, to invest in the railways west of Cardiff?
00:12Because the truth is that not only did the spending review deliver painfully little for Welsh Rail, it delivered literally nothing for the railways in the region that I represent.
00:23Nothing to fix chronic delays and cancellations on the Heart of Wales line, which are some of the worst customer satisfaction ratings across the whole of Wales.
00:33Nothing to improve the Cambrian line, nothing for a new station in St Clair's, something which this Welsh Government has committed to but has shown no intention of ever delivering.
00:44I could go on, but we'd be here for a very long time.
00:47So are you of the view, Cabinet Secretary, that the people of mid and west Wales deserve less?
00:54And if not, why did the Welsh Government not even ask, never mind fight, for the kind of investment our railways so desperately need?
01:03Instead, we have now, for the first time, development money.
01:07Development money. For years we haven't been able to progress schemes, not just in south-west Wales, mid-Wales, but also across the whole of Wales.
01:15We haven't been able to pursue them unless we have funded them.
01:18But funding rail development, when it's not devolved, is extremely difficult when you're comparing that sort of investment against the need to invest in hospitals.
01:26Most advanced projects were agreed between DFT and the Welsh Government, because they are the projects that can be taken forward within this spending period.
01:36And I'm not going to play regions off against each other.
01:39It's absolutely right that we take forward the projects that are most advanced, that we can draw down the funding for.
01:45Otherwise, we could be promised the money. It would never be spent.
01:49Samuel Kurtz.
01:50Thank you, Kevin Campbell, for this question. It's quite disingenuous when you're saying that you're not pitting regions of Wales off against each other.
01:58When there was a project ready to go at St. Clair's, I met with TFW, DFT officials on site.
02:05There was a project ready to go, yet five stations within 13 miles of each other in Cardiff and Newport get the green light before a project in West Wales, which is ready to be delivered.
02:17So tell me, Cabinet Secretary, if that's not playing off areas of Wales against each other, what do you think it's a fair question to ask?
02:23We are actually working with the region on this particular proposal.
02:27We've been working with the UK government as well to develop plans for a station there.
02:32And that's all part of the pipeline of longer-term enhancements that I've just outlined to Kevin Campbell.
02:37We're working as well with the local authority and the corporate joint committee as they put together their regional transport plan.
02:46And it will be for the region to be able to advise Welsh government on what it thinks is a priority in that area, not just in terms of responsibilities that the region holds itself, but also responsibilities that Welsh ministers and UK government ministers have.
02:57We will work collectively to deliver this scheme.
03:00Some of those issues.
03:02I'd like to specifically ask you about two of the lines that are in mid and west Wales.
03:07There's the Heart of Wales line and there's the Cambrian line.
03:10On the Cambrian line, we were promised an hourly service and we still have a two-hourly service.
03:16You talked about, you know, North Wales having two trains an hour.
03:20We dream of that throughout the year, not just in the summer months.
03:25Throughout the year, we want multiple carriages and we want them to be hourly.
03:29Could you please outline what your plans are, your commitments, and the absolute timelines that we want to see for the restoration of those services?
03:40Low passenger usage is a major issue to contend with.
03:43If we're going to put on more services across the network, we have to drive up the fare box.
03:47To drive up the fare box, we have to ensure that capacity is where demand is highest.
03:51That secures the maximum amount of resource to then cross-subsidise those services that have a higher cost per passenger price.
03:59On the Cambrian line, Transport for Wales are now operating more services following the May timetable change.
04:05A new 1630 service from Shrewsbury to Aberystwyth along with more Sunday services are now being initiated.
04:13And I just want to say something about performance because we've heard claims that performance is abysmal on the network.
04:20Actually, performance of services on both the Heart of Wales line and the Cambrian line have improved.
04:26And there have been more services on time, fewer cancellations compared to last year.
