Rail investment pipelines: Transport Committee will investigate supporting industry to improve the railways

How the Government can ensure a stable pipeline of projects, enhancements and procurements to improve the railways will be the focus of a new Transport Committee inquiry. 

Establishing clear investment pipelines could help end the turbulent years of boom and bust in the rail supply industry and give more certainty to passengers, workers, suppliers and investors about priorities for developing the network's assets and services.   

Recent months have seen announcements that business will continue at some companies that manufacture rolling stock, and the Government recommitting in its Autumn Statement to electrifying railways and building new lines. 

But the cross-party Committee's new inquiry will examine how investment pipelines could put the rail supply and manufacturing sector – along with thousands of jobs in its supply chains – on a safer, more sustainable footing. 

A September 2024 survey of rail suppliers showed nearly all seeing a hiatus in work, being unsure of future investment streams, and many considering shifting focus to other markets or making redundancies. 

There are also widespread concerns that the sector is facing a skills crisis, with recent surveys by the National Skills Academy for Rail pointing to an ageing workforce with high rates of attrition. 

Investment pipelines could include detailed, multi-year plans of the orders for rolling stock and contracts to carry out infrastructure enhancements, including upgrades that would help decarbonise the railway network, and improve accessibility and services across the country. The Committee will investigate how these plans should be developed, why such plans haven't been set out in the past, and whether a steady pipeline of projects could promote confidence from investors and reduce unit costs when building infrastructure. 

The full terms of reference for the inquiry are below.     

Chair of the Transport Committee Ruth Cadbury said:         

“For years, the stop-start inconsistency of investment in new trains and network enhancements has kept passengers, freight operators and the rail supply industry guessing about which improvements will be delivered, and when.  

“To protect jobs and ensure Britain continues to have a successful rail supply industry and services that continue to improve, this Committee will listen to businesses from the breadth of the supply chains, and others in the industry, to understand why it has been so hard to get a stable forward-plan and to recommend realistic solutions to the Government. 

“Undertaking investment sporadically can lead to higher unit costs and unnecessary costs to the taxpayer. And the absence of clear pipelines will simply mean that companies, which provide thousands of skilled jobs in communities that need them, may continue to face uncertainty and potential peril in the years ahead.”    

Call for written evidence     

To inform this work, the Committee would welcome written evidence, via its website, addressing any or all of the following questions by 23.59 on 7 February 2025. 

a.      What have been the barriers to establishing stable and transparent long-term investment pipelines in the past (such as for track enhancements, station upgrades, and rolling stock orders) and how can they be overcome? 

b.      What funding sources need to be drawn on to plan such pipelines and is an appropriate framework in place for the allocation of funding to different projects? 

c.       How could a potential pipeline provide transparency and certainty for industry? For example: 

                                                        i.what time period should it cover? 

                                                       ii.what level of project specification should it include? 

                                                     iii.what commitments from Government should it include in both the short and long-term? 

                                                     iv.what budgets and sources of public funding should it encompass? 

                                                       v.how should it engage private investment? 

d.      What role should the industry play in the development of this pipeline and how should Government engage with industry in its delivery? 

e.      What role would a long-term rail investment pipeline play in developing the railway supply workforce? 

f.        How should a pipeline interact with the Government's development of a wider long term rail strategy, rolling stock strategy, infrastructure strategy, and the Invest 35 industrial strategy?