Southeastern Railway Timetable Changes

Carolyn Harris Excerpts

Tuesday 6th December 2022 Westminster Hall

[Sir David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Harris; it is the first time for me as well. I am particularly pleased to see my personal and political friend, the Minister of State, Department for Transport, my hon. Friend the Member for Bexhill and Battle (Huw Merriman) in his place to respond to the debate.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Eltham (Clive Efford), from my neighbouring borough, on securing this important debate and thank him for doing so. He made a powerful case with the facts and figures on passenger numbers. That is very important and he has done a good job and a good service for us in south-east London by raising those figures.

I am grateful for the opportunity to raise such an important issue on behalf of my constituents in Bexleyheath and Crayford. The decisions affect so much and so many people adversely. I am pleased to see present a number of colleagues from both the Conservative and Labour parties, singing from the same hymn sheet. It is important that these issues are considered to be cross-party. We are grateful to participate in the hon. Member for Eltham’s debate.

Bexley is not on either the London underground or Docklands light railway network. Although the Elizabeth line was originally proposed to run through Bexley and hopefully to Ebbsfleet, it now terminates at Abbey Wood in Greenwich, so there are limited viable alternatives to Southeastern rail services for the people of our area to use to get into central London. For example, although it is fewer than 15 miles from my home in Bexleyheath to Westminster, to travel exclusively by bus would probably take two hours, which is just not practical in any day-to-day commute. My constituents are therefore more reliant than most on rail services to travel to central London, whether to commute, to go to health meetings or for social reasons. For hospitals, work and pleasure, they use the railway and they use those services.

I know the hon. Member for Eltham is, like me, a regular commuter, as we often travel on the same train. As such, we know and appreciate constituents’ anger about the services that they pay for and share the view that Southeastern, having a monopoly, is failing its customers. However, rather than talk about the shocking service that we have suffered over many years, and which the hon. Gentleman and I have batted away regularly over the past five or six years at least, I shall focus today on the inconsiderate, unfair and damaging new timetable that Southeastern plans to implement later this month.

The new timetable affects all three of the lines that go through my constituency, as the Bexleyheath, Sidcup and Woolwich lines all go through Bexleyheath and Crayford. My constituency of Bexleyheath and Crayford is currently served badly by those services, and the changes will be a disaster because the service will suffer, as the hon. Member for Eltham said in his excellent speech.

The Bexleyheath line is served by Barnehurst and Bexleyheath stations in my constituency and by Welling station, which is in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup (Mr French) but is used by a number of my constituents. The changes will mean that the line will no longer enjoy off-peak or weekend services to Charing Cross. The services running will be only two trains per hour to Cannon Street and two trains per hour to Victoria.

The Sidcup line, which serves Crayford station in my constituency, will lose the off-peak and weekend services to Cannon Street, with the majority of those services being transferred to Charing Cross, with the result that four trains per hour will go there. The timetable changes mean the loss of our loop line, with the end of the direct service to get on the Elizabeth line at Abbey Wood. That is a disadvantage for commuters who need to go to the Docklands or other places via the excellent Elizabeth line.

The Woolwich line is served by Slade Green station in my constituency and by Erith station, which is used by a lot of my constituents in the Barnehurst and North End wards. The relevant services will go only to Cannon Street at both peak and off-peak times.

The new timetable has met with huge dismay across our borough of Bexley, and indeed throughout other parts of south-east London. My constituents and I are bitterly disappointed by, and rather angry about, the lack of consultation on the dramatic changes that are taking place that will affect rail users and businesses across our south-east region.

Southeastern has explained the reasons why it did not consult, which I do not accept—I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup has been even more robust in that division. I advise Southeastern, and the Minister, that if it consulted on the timetable now, it would be amazed at the overwhelming opposition from people from all sections of the community, of all ages, and from all the travelling public. I remain totally unconvinced about why some of the Cannon Street services at off-peak times and at weekends cannot be substituted on the Bexleyheath line for some Charing Cross services instead.

Southeastern has explained to me—very badly and disappointingly—that the reason for the new timetable is, as the hon. Member for Eltham said, to untangle the crossovers in the line at Lewisham and improve punctuality. I was at meetings with the hon. Gentleman about a previous consultation when that was disproved. I do not accept the views of Southeastern. It has failed to acknowledge the disruption and the added time that journeys will require in order for people to change at London Bridge, which will cause more inconvenience for our constituents when they travel.

The Bexleyheath line has enjoyed direct services to Charing Cross since the Victoria era. A year or two ago, we celebrated the 150th anniversary of the Crayford line, which goes through Sidcup. The new timetable will see the Charing Cross to Bexleyheath line come to an end for off-peak services, with only two trains an hour at peak times, which is totally inadequate for the needs of constituents. Those commuting at that time often face delays that tend to originate from Dartford, at the kick-off, not from the crossover at Lewisham.

The status given to Cannon Street as a major terminus area is absolute nonsense. Cannon Street is a commuter line. It is a ghost area outside the rush hour. Families would not take the train to Cannon Street to go to a Saturday afternoon matinee at the theatre or to an appointment with a doctor or consultant at a London hospital. It is unbelievably crass to suggest that that is fine. Barely anyone wants to travel to Cannon Street for non-work purposes, while Charing Cross is the most popular service for rail users travelling to London from Bexley for both work and leisure. The staff and the ambience at Charing Cross is very good, commensurate with safety and security, and there is a buzz there. I do not think there is that buzz at Cannon Street, even in the rush hour.

Frankly, the changes are inconsiderate, totally unfair and lacking in logic. As I have mentioned, although it is a London borough, Bexley does not have a tube station. The residents therefore want a reliable, good service to get them to their place of work, hospital appointments and social events. We have fought on a bipartisan basis across my borough of Bexley and Greenwich, and also with Lewisham, to say that this is what people want and expect. In other parts of the country, such as on the Essex side of the Thames, the train service is so much better. I can never understand how it is that my personal assistant Perry Taylor can get in much quicker and easier from Billericay than we can from south-east London. We are closer to London than he is, and he is never late—I hope he will not be late tomorrow, at any rate.

The train service available for rail users at London Bridge to get to their destinations is unacceptable. It will also add unnecessary stress and time for passengers. A number of people based at the House of Commons do not work peak times. They are going home, as we are, after 10 o’clock at night, which means that they have to change at London Bridge station. That makes things far worse and they will get home even later. I know we have more user-friendly hours in Parliament than we were used to in the past, but we were still here last night voting at 10 o’clock. The staff have to be here after that. A lot of them work in this property and are on our line down to Dartford.

There are also vulnerable passengers, such as the elderly, those with mobility issues and parents with pushchairs, who have to navigate lifts, escalators and stairs to get on to the main concourse and on to the next line. Whereas, when they come to Charing Cross, they can go straight through to Eltham, Welling, Bexleyheath or wherever, without changing. Once they are on the train, they know they are there until they get to their destination station. Coming home late means more time, more hassle and more stress. We are here as representatives of the people to support constituents and the best service for them—not one that is convenient to civil servants and Southeastern, but one that is convenient to the people who pay the bills. That is why I am passionate and cross about the new timetable.

One concern raised by people in Crayford is that they lose the loop around to Abbey Wood. Although that is not devastating, it is certainly disappointing, because people moved to our area in the belief that it meant that they could commute reasonably quickly into London, but that will not happen under these new proposals. A lack of connectivity with the Elizabeth line is a great disappointment, and I ask for that to be looked at again.

Bexley borough generally has poor transport links from north to south. Buses and trains run more from east to west, though buses are impacted by traffic. There is considerably more traffic in Bexley now than there was a decade ago. We have been given no reasonable explanation why the connectivity service should be removed.

I have had many meetings and discussions, as well as written communications, with Ministers present and past from the Department for Transport over the years, as has the hon. Member for Eltham. That includes the current Minister over the past month or two. I have also asked questions in Parliament, raised debates and collaborated with parliamentary neighbours and the leader of Bexley Council on transport issues affecting our borough. Yet we have seen no progress, despite the increasing cost of fares and the frustration for railway users.

We need—we deserve—to see improvements finally, and we thought we were getting there with longer trains, more trains and newer trains. Does the hon. Member for Eltham remember that? We were going to get all those things. Well, they have not materialised. Now we are getting detrimental cuts to our services, just when we are trying to encourage people to go back to the office and other workplaces, and to go to the city and enjoy the recreational facilities in London, which is the greatest city in the world.

I appreciate the time and sympathy that our new Rail Minister has given me and my parliamentary neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Old Bexley and Sidcup, and colleagues on the Labour Benches. He has listened and we appreciate that very much. However, the new timetable needs to be amended and changed, so that residents in south-east London—not just Bexley but all south-east London boroughs affected—have the benefit of a better service. They need to be consulted. This needs to be thought about again. We are being told that we cannot do anything because this has already been agreed with everybody, even though we did not agree with it and did not even know much about it until quite recently. We need to be consulted on changes for when the next timetables come in, because these new timetables are not fit for purpose.

[Carolyn Harris (in the Chair)]

I will not impose a time limit at the moment, but I will call the Front Benchers to speak from 3.37 pm. I hope colleagues will bear that in mind.