THE Peninsular Rail Group (PRG) said it was 'enormously encouraged' by the investment in new express trains announced by the Chancellor George Osborne in the budget last week.

In his statement to the House of Commons the Chancellor promised to deliver at least £7.2-billion of investment in transport.

He said: 'This Budget goes even further, with the announcement of a new rail franchise with new intercity express trains and greatly improved rail services.'

PRG are hoping that the Government chooses to re-open and upgrade the former Plymouth-Tavistock-Okehampton line, one of the options being considered to avoid the chaos caused by the closure of the Dawlish seafront railway line, the main rail link into the South West, due to winter storms.

Richard Searight, the chairman of PRG, told the Times: 'For far too long we have had to manage with 40-year-old HST rolling stock — castoffs from networks nearer London.

'In fact in the South West we actually need sophisticated trains in order to cope with our demanding rail routes.

'This said, we in Tavistock and Okehampton are still left with a two hour round trip car journey to get on a train at all.

'While the Dawlish disaster cut Plymouth off for 52 days, costing £1.2-billion to the local economy, we have been cut off for over 46 years!

'If little more than half the money lost during those 52 days had been invested in restoring our Northern Route, not only would the economic damage have been minimal, but train services to 100,000 people cut off during the Beeching Era would have been restored.'

Mr Searight said that PRG would be looking 'very carefully' at the scope of the South West franchises to be announced in the next couple of weeks.

He said: 'We would like to see the first phase of the restoration of our line completed with a proper national train service restored into Okehampton, in time for the 50th year commemorations of the annexation of our line in three years time.

'Politicians particip-ating in the election hustings on April 24 in Tavistock will need to be both well informed on these issues and have crystal clear polices on how and when our train services are to be restored — for just one tenth of the cost of the £7.2-billion allocated for new rolling stock.'

The Devon and Cornwall Rail Partnership promotes travel on rural branch lines and seeks improvements to services and facilities.

Its manager, Richard Burningham, when asked by the Times what he thought of the Chancellor's Budget statement in the house on a new franchise for Devon and Cornwall rail service, said: 'The new franchise idea really came out of the blue when George Osborne was in Plymouth in January and I think we're all still waiting to see what the Government has in mind.'