Delay Repay: Great Eastern Main Line

James Cartlidge Excerpts

Wednesday 30th January 2019 Commons Chamber

[James Cartlidge (South Suffolk) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this debate, which I welcome. He is a great campaigner on this issue. One cause of dissatisfaction among our constituents on this line is the fact that they so often have to stand. Does he agree that we should look at compensation for not only delays but standing? Is it right that someone who stands, often for two hours or more, pays the same fare as someone who has a seat?

[Will Quince]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. He is right; nobody should be standing on a train for this length of time. Nobody should be standing to get to London Liverpool Street from average commuter towns like Chelmsford or Colchester, or even as far as Norwich. The journey from Chelmsford is about 40 minutes, from Colchester it is about 55 minutes and from Norwich it is one hour and 45 minutes or even two hours; we hope to get that down to one hour and 45 minutes with the new trains. Increased capacity will come with the new trains, but there is a massive issue with standing. It is not uncommon to see people—indeed, I have done it myself—standing between Colchester and London. That is not acceptable.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport (Andrew Jones)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince) on securing this debate and on giving us the opportunity to discuss these issues. I thank other hon. Members for their contributions. We have had a very positive debate.

I fully recognise the importance of the rail service to the communities my hon. Friends represent. It is not just a question of access to the beautiful landscapes of north Essex or south Suffolk; the line serves areas of economic growth, where we are seeing innovative businesses, high-tech and state-of-the-art businesses, and growth in life sciences and renewable energy. The great eastern main line plays a significant role in unlocking the economic potential and improving quality of life in the areas my hon. Friends represent.

I also fully acknowledge the passion that rail can generate. As people have said, the constant struggle to know what is happening on a network and the impact of delays on people’s ability to make connections, get to work on time and handle childcare arrangements can be incredibly stressful and frustrating and we should be working flat out to minimise the need for any compensation to be paid at all.

I will address some of the issues raised. Obviously, we have focused today on Delay Repay, as that is the key point of the debate, but I will also touch on the issues of the performance of the network and the new trains that colleagues have raised. On Delay Repay, I recognise that, when things go wrong, we must have some means of appropriate redress. As my hon. Friend the Member for Braintree (James Cleverly) said, people are pragmatic and understand that things can go wrong; they just do not want them to go wrong regularly. Exceptional events we can understand.

These services are critical to how we run our lives. Delay Repay compensation is in place on most of our franchises. In its original form, it offered compensation for delays of 30 minutes or more, but we are improving the scheme by rolling out Delay Repay 15, under which compensation is paid for delays of 15 minutes or more, which will give passengers a better deal. It provides compensation of 25% of the ticket price for delays of 15 minutes or more and of 50% for 30 minutes or more, whatever the cause of the delay or the cancelation and whatever the ticket type.

[James Cartlidge]

The principle underpinning Delay Repay is that people should be compensated for any inconvenience caused, which brings me back to the intervention I made on my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince). Given that a seat is part of a person’s understanding of the contract of their ticket, if they have had to stand for the entire journey, is there not a principle that they should be entitled to recompense?

[Andrew Jones]

It would be very challenging to introduce that extra condition to the compensation structures. We must try to ensure that there are enough seats, but it is hard to guarantee that everyone will have a seat on every occasion. The right to a seat is not actually included in the ticket—the ticket entitles the passenger to ride and to complete the journey, but not to have a seat—although of course we want passengers to have comfortable seats, along with access to wi-fi, power sockets and so forth. I am aware of the issue that my hon. Friend has raised, and I will certainly give it further consideration.

We introduced Delay Repay 15 in Britain’s largest rail franchise, Govia Thameslink, on 11 December 2016, and it was introduced in c2c in February 2018. It is also part of the new South Western and West Midlands franchises, and was introduced most recently in the Northern franchise, last December. It will be a contractual requirement for all other Department for Transport franchises when contracts come up for renewal, so it will become a regular feature of what our rail service looks like up and down the country.

Greater Anglia currently offers Delay Repay 30. We have been actively engaged with the company to secure an affordable and value-for-money scheme for the Delay Repay 15 launch, and the process of agreeing on commercial terms is at an advanced stage. We are not quite there yet, but I can tell Members that I am confident of being able to bring them some news within weeks. I will, of course, ensure that I keep everyone informed of our progress. The Department is doing significant work in liaising with Greater Anglia. The delays in introducing the scheme in franchises are due to the complications involved in changing the nature of the contractual arrangements, and that is the only reason for the delay in this instance.