Railways Bill (Committee Stage)
Lord Faulkner of Worcester moved Amendment No. 88:
"DEPOSIT OF RAILWAY RECORDS The Secretary of State shall come to an agreement with the trustees of the Science Museum to ensure the provision of a place of deposit for records generated within the railway industry which are not public records for the purposes of the Public Records Act 1958 (c. 51)."
The noble Lord said: In moving Amendment No. 88, I should declare an unpaid interest as chairman of the Railway Heritage Committee. The amendment is necessary because the national archives at Kew house a record of Britain's railways from their inception to the mid-1990s, but the records of the industry since the privatisation of the railway have no place of deposit because they are not public records.
So the purpose of the new clause is to require the Secretary of State to work with the trustees of the Science Museum—that is, in effect the National Railway Museum (NRM) at York—to secure a place of deposit for the archive of the railway industry.
Unless that is done, there is a risk that the records of perhaps the most turbulent and historically important period of railway history in recent times will be lost to future generations.
I should make clear that the Railway Heritage Committee strongly supports the setting up of a railway industry national archive, and wants to see it based at the NRM in York. The NRM is keen to oblige and wants to provide the space necessary as part of a broader project aimed at providing good basic accommodation and much enhanced public access for its existing archive and library collections.
At present, the material is housed in very low-standard accommodation, which is getting worse, and much of it is inaccessible to the public, despite the ever-increasing public demand for access. The project, which is termed the "Search Engine", was costed at just under £4 million in 2004 and is currently the subject of a very protracted fund-raising campaign by the National Railway Museum.
The project is strongly supported by the Science Museum and the chairman of the board of trustees, the noble Lord, Lord Waldegrave of North Hill, who unfortunately cannot be present today. He has asked me to read to the Committee part of a letter he wrote to Andrew Scott, the head of the National Railway Museum. In the letter the noble Lord, Lord Waldegrave, says that he is all for the amendment,
"if it encourages the Department for Transport to take some responsibility for the funding of the Railway Industry National Archive. What the Department cannot do is simply say that NMSI [National Museum of Science and Industry] or NRM can absorb this in existing budgets".
The current position is that around half the funds are to hand, with significant sums committed by the Higher Education Funding Council via the University of York and from the National Museum of Science and Industry.
The NRM can fund £460,000 itself and from private sponsors, but the project still requires something approaching £2 million. It has been turned down once by the Heritage Lottery Fund, although discussions with the fund are continuing and with the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.
Everyone in the industry agrees that the railway industry national archive is an important project. We would like to be able to go to the train operators to ask them for help, but they find it difficult to make charitable donations if they are in receipt of a government subsidy. If we leave the matter too long the changes that take place in the industry, as companies come and go, will mean that the records cannot be kept. For example, Connex, Arriva Northern, Thames Trains, and Railtrack of course, have all disappeared from the scene already. If we do not have a properly funded national archive, that record material will be lost.
So I hope very much that my noble friend will take this opportunity to indicate that the Government support the project; and that the Department for Transport is willing to get involved and help find the funding to facilitate what is seen as one of the most important railway heritage projects of the present time. I beg to move.
© Lords Hansard 9 March 2005