Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Davies of Gower on 6 March (HL2701), whether they have received any representations from Chiltern Railways about ending the direct access services between Northolt Junction and Paddington.

Answered by Lord Davies of Gower - Shadow Secretary of State for Wales

There are no plans to reinstate direct access services from Northolt Junction to Paddington.

Chiltern Railways used to run a twice-daily service from Northolt Junction (i.e. South Ruislip Station) to London Paddington. In December 2018, this route was cancelled with the closure of the Acton to Northolt line to enable High Speed 2 works. Chiltern Railways made representations to alternatively run to West Ealing via the Greenford branch line, however this was not possible due to Crossrail capacity constraints.

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Davies of Gower on 6 March (HL2700), when they expect the train service specification for the TransPennine route to be finalised and approved.

Answered by Lord Davies of Gower - Shadow Secretary of State for Wales

Network Rail will be using standard industry processes to progressively formalise train service changes as the programme progresses, in line with the TransPennine Route Upgrade’s (TRU’s) key delivery milestones. The last stage of the fully approved timetables will be in place in the early 2030s when the full service uplift, which TRU enables, is able to come on line.

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Davies of Gower on 6 March (HL2702), whether any proportion of the costs of the Delay Repay scheme have resulted in a direct cost to public funds; and if so, how much.

Answered by Lord Davies of Gower - Shadow Secretary of State for Wales

At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, when revenues dropped very significantly, the Government introduced emergency agreements that transferred day-to-day revenue and cost risks to the Department. These agreements protected services that key workers depended on. Under the agreements, the Government effectively receives the revenue and pays an operator’s reasonable costs, subject to the revenue incentive mechanism introduced recently to encourage operators to grow patronage and revenues.

Operators are compensated by the Government for all reasonable costs incurred that are accumulated in accordance with the terms of the contract, including those in relation to Delay Repay.

Payments made to rail passengers for Delay Repay as well as discretionary compensation are published annually, and for 2022-23 totalled £101 million.

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of whether the revised timetable for the East Coast Main Line will be delivered by December 2024.

Answered by Lord Davies of Gower - Shadow Secretary of State for Wales

We are disappointed with the deferment of the East Coast Main Line timetable upgrade which cannot be delivered robustly in December 2024.

The industry steering group that oversees timetable introduction concluded that there are too many outstanding issues to have confidence in the upgrade being ready in 2024.

It is important that Network Rail continues to develop a process for delivering the upgraded timetable and realising the benefits of £4 billion investment in track and train.

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask His Majesty's Government whether they plan to develop a recovery strategy for rail routes on which reduced services following the COVID-19 pandemic but have now recouped revenue and passenger numbers.

Answered by Lord Davies of Gower - Shadow Secretary of State for Wales

As the pandemic has changed travel habits, train operators are using this opportunity to reassess their services to provide rail timetables that respond to new passenger travel patterns, and carefully balance cost, capacity and performance.

Timetables should be demand-led and built with flexibility in mind, so if passenger numbers increase as we continue to recover from the pandemic, we can look to accommodate additional services. Where operators have modified their timetables, the changes are kept under review and, where appropriate, adjusted to reflect fluctuations in demand. Additional services will be included in the upcoming timetable change.

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask His Majesty's Government how the performance of open-access operators compares with the major operator of services on the routes which they share.

Answered by Lord Davies of Gower - Shadow Secretary of State for Wales

The Office of Rail and Road collects and publishes data on cancellations, reliability and punctuality of all rail operators, including Open Access operators. This is set out in the attached table.

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Davies of Gower on 29 April (HL3879), whether the latest announcement about the postponement of the introduction of an updated timetable for the East Coast Mainline Railway is due to the Office of Rail and Road's rigidity in agreeing access rights, which cannot be made flexible with the train operators' agreement.

Answered by Lord Davies of Gower - Shadow Secretary of State for Wales

Timetable production and access rights issues are governed by Network Rail’s Network Code, which is regulated by the Office of Rail and Road. We expect the rail industry to work through these issues in order to deliver the upgraded timetable and realise the benefits of £4bn investment in track and train.

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask His Majesty's Government, further to the Written Answer by Lord Davies of Gower on 13 May (HL4207), what impact the rigidity of the Network Code has had on the revision of train timetables on the East Coast Main Line; and what consideration they have given to instructing the parties, including the Office of Rail and Road, to revise the code to enable a satisfactory timetable to be delivered.

Answered by Lord Davies of Gower - Shadow Secretary of State for Wales

The industry steering group that oversees timetable introduction concluded that there were too many outstanding issues to have confidence that the new East Coast Main Line timetable can be delivered robustly in December 2024.

Timetable production and access rights issues are governed by Network Rail’s Network Code, which is regulated by the ORR as the independent regulator to the rail industry. We expect the rail industry to work through these issues in order to deliver the upgraded timetable and realise the benefits of £4bn investment in track and train on the East Coast Main Line.