Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced last week that a Conservative majority Government would establish a £500M Beeching Reversal Fund to reconnect towns that have suffered since their railways were removed.

Labour’s Shadow Transport Secretary Andy McDonald responded: “This isn’t new, the Conservatives announced it two years ago to try to distract from the collapse of the East Coast franchise which ultimately cost taxpayers £2Bn. Unsurprisingly not one of the Beeching cuts has been restored.”

It is also thought that investment needed to reverse the Beeching cuts would far exceed the £500M figure pledged by the Conservatives.

A spokesman for the Liberal Democrats said: “The Tories’ £500M is barely enough to reopen one railway line, let alone the 5000 miles of railway lines closed under Beeching. When the Scottish Borders railway between Tweedbank and Edinburgh reopened in 2015, it cost around £300M.”

Earlier this year, the Campaign for Better Transport called on the Government to commit £4.8Bn to a national rail reopening programme to deliver 33 new rail lines and 72 new stations, including reinstating many lost to Beeching.

Priorities singled out by the Conservatives as candidates for its Beeching Reversal Fund include restoring the Ashington to Blyth line in Northumberland and well as stations at Willenhall and Darlaston near Walsall and at Skelmersdale in Lancashire.

Campaign group Railfuture’s spokesman Bruce Williamson welcomed the Prime Minister’s promise of reopening railways but emphasised that £500M will not go very far.

“We need an on going commitment to investment in the railways and not just at election time,” he said, adding that little progress has been made since the Government set out ambitions to reinstate lost lines at the end of 2017.

“There are numerous campaigns up and down the country to open various bits of line but it is frustratingly slow.” Among the group’s top priorities for reopenings are Ashington to Blyth and Skelmersdale as well as the Uckfield to Lewes line in East Sussex, Wisbech to Cambridge, Cowley to Oxford and the St Andrews railway link in Fife, Scotland.

Election promises on rail from the other parties include a pledge by Labour to re-nationalise the railways, while the Liberal Democrats are expected to announce a large investment in rail later this week.

Additional measures expected to be in Labour’s manifesto include the establishment of community car sharing clubs offering low carbon vehicles for hire and investing £1.3Bn a year to reverse cuts made to over 3000 bus routes since 2010.

The Conservatives also set out plans to boost investment in cycling and walking through a £350M infrastructure fund and the creation of a long term cycling programme and budget.

More specific actions would include piloting low traffic ‘healthy neighbourhoods’, increasing provision for separated bike lanes on main roads, improving footways and a pilot to incentivise GPs to prescribe bicycles or bike hire to patients.

(Photograph: Brian Hart)