Confidence in the Secretary of State for Transport

Debate between Andy McDonald and Bob Stewart

Tuesday 19th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Andy McDonald]

We can have that discussion, but today I am dealing with these services and I am going to concentrate on them.

Senior officials directly interfered. Let us not forget that the managing director of passenger services at the Department for Transport, Peter Wilkinson, said two years ago:

“we’re going to be having punch-ups and we will see industrial action”

and that he wanted to run people “out of my industry.”

The introduction of the May 2018 timetable required change on an unprecedented scale. The process of managing change requires co-operation, dialogue, engagement and good will. The Government and the management of Northern and GTR have destroyed their relationships with their employees. Millions of passengers in the UK are paying the price for the belligerence and the antagonistic approach of the Secretary of State.

[Bob Stewart (Beckenham) (Con)]

I know the Secretary of State and I know his Ministers. I bet a pound to a dollar that the Secretary of State and his Ministers pulled in the people responsible for the railway companies and got assurances from them that this would work well. I really feel it is quite unfair, because I am absolutely convinced that the Secretary of State, who I know well, would have checked this out. He has been let down very badly by the railway companies.

[Andy McDonald]

The hon. Gentleman makes an excellent point, but in support of my argument. He is demonstrating that that did not work. That was not a very good way of going about business, relying on people giving assurances rather than saying, “Show me. Where’s your evidence?” You do that before you go ahead with it. You do not rely on people telling you nonsense.

Ever since the timetable chaos arose, we have witnessed carefully crafted statements that try to ensure as little responsibility as possible can be attributed to the Department for Transport and the Secretary of State in charge of it. Let us consider the situation. This is a Government who refuse to recognise the accumulated evidence that their privatised structure of the railway is failing. Therefore, they refuse to accept a sensible and practical railway structure that can function properly.