My Lords, it is a pleasure to take part in this Second Reading debate. In doing so, I declare my technology interests as an adviser variously to the Crown Estate and to Simmons & Simmons LLP.

Like other noble Lords, my thoughts are with all those who were affected on 7/7. I remember that day so clearly. It was less than 24 hours after we had won the right to stage the 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games. In that 24-hour period we saw the best of humanity in the bid, we saw the worst of humanity in those terrorist atrocities, and, instantaneously, we saw the best of humanity in all the first responders and members of the public, who ran towards danger to help all those affected on the transport network and beyond.

I congratulate the Minister on the way in which he introduced this Second Reading debate. I would introduce a slight note of discord into our Second Reading proceedings, in that I hope the Minister does not keep his job when the new Prime Minister comes in, because his experience, expertise and enthusiasm for transport need to be recognised. I hope he can come back to your Lordships’ House as Secretary of State for Transport—I know he shares that political ambition.

I was delighted to listen to the valedictory speech of the noble Lord, Lord Wilson of Dinton. I had the good fortune to work with him many years ago when he was doing excellent work on inclusion and accessibility as Cabinet Secretary. It was an honour and a pleasure to work with him, though, having heard some of the other contributions in this debate this afternoon, I feel somewhat slighted that at no point did he ever try to shove into my hand a bound copy of Hansard—again demonstrating his wisdom, in that he obviously understood it would have been of absolutely no use to me whatever.

We are in the midst of a transport legislation movie. We have had the civil aviation Bill, we are now on the Railways Bill, and later down the track we have a roads Bill. It really is “Planes, Trains and Automobiles”. In my Second Reading contribution, I would like to consider that we are also in the midst of an AI revolution. Rail was the white heat technology of its time, and there are lessons we can learn from the revolution in rail, for both rail and the Bill, and for our approach to artificial intelligence.

Be in no doubt that rail was extraordinary. Steam literally changed time. What did we learn about safety and security? Brunel’s brilliant bells and whistles system is, in reality, still an extraordinarily effective way to do signalling. As for how we need to communicate the benefits and possibilities of rail, at the time when rail emerged it was often thought that you would get mortally injured and probably not reach the end of your journey on these horror machines from hell. What did Brunel do? He did not build stations but built cathedrals to the railway, at London Paddington and Bristol Temple Meads. What an extraordinary demonstration of the innovation of technology from both Brunel and the extraordinary Daniel Gooch.

That innovation needs to be brought right up to date with our approach to the railways and to artificial intelligence. What we saw with rail is that, when you have such innovation and you connect it through communicating it to the public, a glamour emerges. Look at how we were nostalgic about the railway so early in its operation. The Railway Children was published in 1905, and later we had Auden’s “Night Mail”, “crossing the Border”, and Philip Larkin coming down late one term from Cambridge in a button-studded leather carriage, witnessing all of those wonderful “Whitsun Weddings”.

Why do we have this glamour around rail and its technology and innovation? Because it is a human-connecting, social experience. It does not just connect us geographically; it connects us socially. That is what Richard Branson fundamentally understood when he took over the franchise, which I had the great pleasure to discuss with him many years ago. He understood that he could not control the track, the signals or the stations, but, for everything he could control and for the staff he trained, he understood that it was about service and the passenger experience.

I suggest that the golden thread to run through the Bill should be passenger experience and how we deliver, from the first touchpoint of considering buying a ticket, that end-to-end service. If you get passenger experience right, you will get accessibility right, because accessibility is just delivering excellence in passenger experience and service. As we have already heard, not least from my noble friend Lady Grey-Thompson and the noble Baroness, Lady Brinton, we are some way off that, which cannot continue. How accessible and inclusive a service is—in this case, the railways—is as good a measure as any of success.

The growth agenda of this Government is critical. Rail can deliver on that. That is also tied to access. The Government have a desire to get more disabled people into work, but it is quite right for a disabled person to ask how they are to get a job when they cannot even get on to a train. How enabling and empowering rail could be. The Bill needs to speak far more to that.

I move beyond passengers, to freight. What has happened to all of the work around digital rail? Where are all the principles from that project? The ambition then was for a 40% increase in freight through digitising the signals. That would be transformational for rail and for our economy. There is so much work being done with autonomous vehicles at the moment, to have a truck that can lead a convoy of 20, 30, 40 or 50 trucks. That sounds very much to me like a train. We need to get freight back on to the rails. It is more effective, more efficient and more able to drive economic activity.

Finally, I ask the Minister about an anomaly. He quite correctly suggests that we have track and train connected, which makes sense from an integration perspective. But what happens in a situation, particularly in London, where we have shared track use between London Underground and rail? It is often the case that, in such instances, things fall between the cracks. Who is responsible when a signal goes down? Does it get fixed in hours or, as is often the case, days? That cannot be acceptable. What does the Bill do to deliver on that currently anomalous situation?

Rail matters, thus the Bill matters extraordinarily. Rail enables us to get about and to get on. Will the Bill succeed? As any prophet has to say to any sceptic, time will tell. There is plenty for us to discuss in Committee across all of these issues. At this stage, perhaps it can be seen as probably the greatest real-time experiment in “railpolitik”.