Confidence in the Secretary of State for Transport

Debbie Abrahams Excerpts

Tuesday 19th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Peter Kyle (Hove) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

[Chris Grayling]

I will give way once or twice during my speech, but as you said, Madam Deputy Speaker, we need to make progress so that people get a chance to contribute. I am going to make some progress before I give way.

As I previously told the House, over the past weeks, passengers on parts of the GTR and Northern franchises have faced totally unsatisfactory levels of service, and I apologise to passengers that have experienced and are experiencing disruption. Since the timetable has been introduced, my Department and the industry have been working round the clock to restore the reliability of the service across the network. Hour by hour, my officials are in contact with GTR, Northern and Network Rail to work to improve the service to passengers.

As I told the House, I have commissioned an independent inquiry. This will be led by the independent rail regulator, Stephen Glaister, to examine why we are in this situation and to avoid it ever happening again. I have met the owners of the franchises and demanded that they improve their operational response, including, in the case of GTR, increasing its managerial capacity. Clearly, nobody wants us to be in the position we find ourselves in today, but let me be absolutely clear: everyone in my Department is as focused as we possibly can be on improving reliability for passengers.

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Grayling]

Absolutely; I agree with my right hon. Friend. This is something that we will have to look at very seriously indeed. There are many lessons to learn from all this, but most immediately, we need to get services back into place for passengers. I have been watching the issues at Eynsford and Shoreham in his constituency. It feels as though they are getting a better service than they were but there is still some way to go, and we need to make sure that that is covered.

[Debbie Abrahams]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

[Caroline Lucas]

Will the Secretary of State give way?

--- Later in debate ---

[Chris Grayling]

I will take two more interventions, and then I will make progress to the end of my remarks so that I do not take up too much speaking time.

[Debbie Abrahams]

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. He will remember that we met on 4 June, when I relayed some of the real issues that my constituents in Oldham and Saddleworth were facing. He said that we should be seeing improvements to the emergency timetable. I said that I would hold him to it, and he also said that he would look at contingency arrangements if there were not improvements. I went back to Greenfield station last Friday and spoke to constituents who use those trains. They said that they had seen only marginal differences, so will the Secretary of State now commit to bringing these franchises—Northern and TransPennine Express—in-house, and will he ensure that there is compensation for TPE passengers as well?

[Chris Grayling]

I will talk about compensation in a moment. I have been watching the performance carefully, and there have been some signs of stabilisation, as I say, but there is still a long way to go. [Interruption.] As I just set out, we have seen some stabilisation. I have been looking at the services day by day, and there is still a way to go, but the decline we saw after the timetable change has at least been arrested, and as the hon. Lady herself admits, there have been some improvements, although not nearly enough. I accept that, and I will take away her comments and look carefully at her line again, but there has been at least a stabilisation.