Avanti West Coast

Debate between Lord Goddard of Stockport and Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill

Monday 27th January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I will have to write to the noble Lord about the amount of Delay Repay. I have statistics here about the number of trains on time and the number of trains cancelled. Although the number of trains being cancelled has been reducing, it is still far too high. Passengers dislike cancelled trains even more than they dislike them being later than in the timetable. I will write to him and put a copy of that letter in the Library. However, I think that the evidence of Delay Repay is the same as the evidence of the performance statistics—that the performance is just not good enough.

[Lord Goddard of Stockport (LD)]

My Lords, Avanti has a simple objective in life: to supply three hours of train from Manchester to London. It is not complicated. It is a straight line. I will give a snapshot of this weekend. On Friday morning, the 8.43, a peak-time train, was cancelled with 20 minutes’ notice. On Saturday, five trains were cancelled due to a lack of staff or extra maintenance being required on trains. This morning, the 8.43, a peak-time train, was again cancelled. Five more trains back to Manchester were cancelled this afternoon. It is utterly unacceptable. I feel for the staff, who try to give us a good service every day on the up and down journey, but the management is lamentable. If you gave Avanti a local pub in London with a 24-hour licence, free beer and free food, it would still not make a profit. It is astonishing. I am lost for words.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Goddard of Stockport (LD)]

I am rarely lost for words. Seriously, the customers are at the heart of this, day in, day out, with children, having the service that the noble Lord, Lord Bradley, has described. It is unacceptable. I hope that the Minister will take cognisance of what is going on. This is nothing to do with the weather, strikes or lines. This is incompetent management.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

The noble Lord is clearly not lost for words. However, it is not within my gift to award free tenancies of public houses in London—probably wisely. A lot of what he says is right, and I will reflect on that with the Avanti management on Friday. My only cautionary note is that the effect of the storms on Friday and Saturday has led to significant disruption to most of the railway in northern England and certainly in Scotland. I have some sympathy with train operators in those circumstances, because there are occasions on which their staff cannot get to work simply because of the effects of the wind and associated damage. One should therefore be a bit careful. As a former operator of public transport, I know that it is sometimes difficult to get the right staff in the right place at the right time, when those circumstances happen. When they do not happen, however, you would expect train operators such as Avanti to have sufficient staff to be able to resource the service and have some reserve of resilience to keep it going in difficult circumstances. I sympathise entirely with what the noble Lord says.

High-speed Rail Services: West Coast Main Line

Debate between Lord Goddard of Stockport and Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill

Wednesday 4th September 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Goddard of Stockport (LD)]

My Lords, it is this side. I have been waiting for a train for 20 minutes.

I congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Liddle, for asking the first friendly Question on railways in the almost 10 years that I have been in this House. He hits the nail on the head. What matters is capacity; this was never about speed. Many times, you get on a train at Euston and the train manager says, “If we don’t leave in two minutes, we’ll be behind the slow train to Milton Keynes or Watford”, and, similarly, from Crewe. Will the Minister liaise with the elected mayors of Liverpool, Manchester and Birmingham and keep trying to work with them? They are the people who understand more about the need to move people around for business, pleasure, leisure and life opportunities.

Also, in the spirit of glasnost, can the Minister keep this House involved in future progress? As the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, just said, the money must come from somewhere. It has been found for the pay offer for the rail drivers. Perhaps it can now be found for the public who travel on those trains.

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

Of course the combined authority mayors have a very important part to play in determining the rail services in their areas. This Government are absolutely committed to discussing with them, on the capacity of the railway, the balance between long-distance travel and travel needed within those areas to create growth, jobs and housing. On future progress, the Government must review the railway as a whole. It is a network. As we do so, no doubt we will be asked questions about it and this House will be fully involved.