East Coast Main Line Call Centre

Grahame Morris Excerpts

Thursday 19th May 2011 Commons Chamber

[Ian Mearns]

The accent is regarded as reliable and trustworthy when it comes to providing call centre services, and that is why the north-east has become a centre for call centre operations. Conversely, it is sad to reflect that unfortunately British customers are averse to call centres based offshore.

[Grahame M. Morris (Easington) (Lab)]

I, too, compliment my hon. Friend on securing a debate on this issue, which is important to the north-east and has some national significance. In view of today’s statement on the McNulty report and the arguments being made by Ministers about needing to reduce the public subsidy to the rail industry, is this not another example of false economy if the method of reducing the subsidy is to transfer overseas UK jobs that support the economy, particularly in areas such as the north-east?

[Ian Mearns]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point. At a time when the Government claim that supporting growth in the UK economy is their priority, surely exporting good quality jobs from the north-east to India cannot be defended. There is also the issue of the public’s perception of the level of service they will get as a result.

The Secretary of State denies responsibility for this while passing on millions in public subsidy. The company received £40 million in direct funding from the taxpayer in the nine months to 31 March 2010 by way of a working capital loan facility agreed with the Secretary of State. Given the investment from the UK taxpayer, surely there must be a moral obligation for a state-owned company to retain jobs in the UK. There should at least be some consideration given to those jobs being taken in-house by the operator. That work is not going to go away. It is a much-needed, public-facing aspect of the train service operation and there is no evidence that the transfer will improve the service afforded to the public.

The Government’s stance could be regarded as hypocritical. They declare their commitment to growth and rebalancing the economy, and day after day they preach to private business about the need to help the economy to recover by creating new jobs, but in the case of East Coast—a company that we fully own—they sit back and permit the export of jobs from a company that belongs to the taxpayer. Let me be clear: my primary concern is for the people whose lives are affected by this, but equally important is the impact on industry of exporting real jobs, particularly customer contact jobs, to another country, which represents a retrograde step away from an integrated transport policy. Despite the McNulty report’s failure seriously to consider the benefits of reintegrating the railways under public ownership, many in the House are convinced that the evidence demonstrates that the reason why railways in Europe are cheaper for the taxpayer and the fare payer is that on the whole they are in public ownership and are less fragmented.

There is a wealth of evidence to show that overseas call centres are not the answer for companies that are looking to cut costs. In May 2004, a Department of Trade and Industry study found that work force costs that had not been fully factored into business evaluations of offshoring included the additional costs of employing local law specialists, consultants and accountants, as well as the cost of redundancies, redeployment and reskilling displaced UK workers. It revealed that staff turnover at Indian call centres in particular was about 25% compared with about 15% in the UK, with an average job tenure of about 12 months compared with three years in the UK. Higher attrition rates surely cannot be beneficial to good-quality customer service.

In July 2009, there was a huge outcry when the Association of Train Operating Companies moved 200 National Rail inquiries jobs from the UK to India. Subsequently, it was widely believed that the quality of service to the British travelling public had decreased. At the same time, BT decided to move 2,000 call-centre jobs back from India to the UK as part of a long-term strategy to cut costs by £1 billion and to reduce dependency on third parties. In 2005, the Select Committee on Trade and Industry reported that customer satisfaction surveys found that UK consumers did not like businesses they believed had offshored their services, preferring to deal with call centres in the UK.

In subcontracting jobs abroad, the company has made a narrow, short-term financial decision. No account has been taken of the impact that the loss of skills and jobs will have on the north-east region, its community and the local economy. Nor has any account been taken of the obvious cost to the UK in benefits of whose who will be made redundant as a result or of the reduction in tax revenue for the Exchequer. The McNulty report states that value for money is not just about pounds and pence, but about how the railway realises its wider benefits to society. Through fragmentation and privatisation, those benefits will be lost.

The industry’s most valuable asset is its work force. These redundancies mark a wasteful loss of knowledge and skills that have been honed through years of experience. They damage the shared commitment to the overall service that a proper public service ethos can bring. They impose a hidden cost of increased interfaces in the industry, blur transparency and accountability and de-clarify lines of responsibility, which would be the hallmark of a more efficient railway.

The blow to the economy of the north-east cannot be overestimated. The loss of these jobs to the region is yet another blow to the local economy and to our local communities. Tyneside already suffers a level of unemployment above the national average. The growth in call centre work has been an important factor in providing new employment in the north-east after the decline of manufacturing and, in particular, heavy industry, which arguably was caused mainly by a previous Government of the same nature.

As we all know, the Government are determined to reduce workers’ rights in the UK. They call it removing red tape and are strongly tempted to try to remove the rights of workers through Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations. However, TUPE has been rendered irrelevant in this situation. A worker having the right to follow their work to the new company is simply not a realistic or viable option for those at Baron house, who now face the complete closure of their workplace, with a move for a few possibly to Plymouth or the bulk to India of course being impractical.

The awarding of this customer contact centre contract to a company with operations in Mumbai should not be seen in isolation. It is the next stage in trying to make the company more attractive to potential bidders in preparation for the eventual re-privatisation of the franchise in 2013. Already this week we have witnessed the end of a buffet car service on the east coast main line and the direct service from London to Glasgow has already been greatly reduced. Clearly the aim of the game is not customer service, or even value for money.

Despite the overwhelming social, environmental and economic benefits of retaining services from London King’s Cross to Glasgow, the direct services have been dramatically scaled back from 13 trains a day to just two, one in each direction—the 6.50 am service from Glasgow to King’s Cross and the 3 pm service heading in the opposite direction.

In the context of the McNulty report, clearly the east coast main line has a troubled history. I will not go into that now, but it is important that we think about the Government’s responsibility to manage that franchise. They do have a responsibility and they can change this decision.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Villiers]

Absolutely, in the north-east and right across the country.

Before responding to the hon. Member’s questions, I must first clarify and reiterate the relationship between the Government and the east coast main line operator. East Coast Main Line Ltd is wholly owned by Directly Operated Railways Ltd, which is, as he pointed out, owned by the Government. East Coast and DOR are companies registered under the Companies Act and operate in accordance with their own articles of association and governance. This provides a framework for the operation of the franchise as a free-standing entity in readiness for the return of the franchise to the private sector, a return that was envisaged by the previous Government as well as the current one.

[Grahame M. Morris]

I am slightly perplexed by that explanation and tempted to think of the situation with the banks. The Chancellor and the Prime Minister have told us that influence is being exerted on the state-owned banks to ensure that they lend to small and medium-sized enterprises. Is the Minister suggesting that such influence cannot be applied on this company with regard to jobs?

[Mrs Villiers]

I will explain the relationship between East Coast and the Secretary of State. The aim is for that relationship to replicate the arrangements for franchises elsewhere on the network in order to ensure that the principles of private sector operation are embraced and maintained. The reason for that approach is so that the Secretary of State is able to protect the value of the franchise and the taxpayer gets value for money when the franchise returns to the private sector.

If the Department or my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State were to start intervening in the way the operator runs East Coast, for example by overturning decisions based on commercial considerations, they might well have to answer for their decisions in front of the Public Accounts Committee. I am afraid that we do not believe it a viable option to intervene on the basis of political or non-commercial considerations, even if the Secretary of State were minded to do so.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mrs Villiers]

As I have made clear, the coalition Government’s adopted approach, which the previous Labour Government espoused, is that the franchise should be operated on a commercial basis by East Coast Ltd. It should not be the subject of political direction from the Secretary of State.

[Grahame M. Morris]

That is a crucial point if we are arguing about commercial decisions. As my hon. Friend the Member for Gateshead (Ian Mearns) said in an excellent speech, is there not a weight of evidence from banks, insurance companies and various private sector companies that overseas call centres are becoming less and less popular, including with customers, and that therefore any move would damage the potential to sell the franchise to the private sector? Is there not an argument that it would be beneficial to the future sale of the company to keep the call centre at least in the UK, but certainly in the north-east, where it is?

[Mrs Villiers]

The people best placed to make the decision about what is best for the East Coast operation are the specialist practitioners who run East Coast Ltd, not Ministers, not Members. Those practitioners are the best people to make the best decision about what is in the interests of fare payers and taxpayers. East Coast is confident that the new arrangements will deliver better services for passengers and far better value for money.