Train Operating Companies: Yorkshire

Lilian Greenwood Excerpts

Wednesday 19th December 2018 Westminster Hall

[Judith Cummins (Bradford South) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Cheryl. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Dewsbury (Paula Sherriff) on securing this important and timely debate. It is a pleasure to follow my hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull North (Diana Johnson). Nobody here needs reminding how terrible a year this has been for rail passengers in Yorkshire and across the north. Since the introduction of the timetable changes in May, we have seen what the Transport Committee rightly called a

“period of intensely inconvenient, costly and, on occasions… potentially dangerous disruption.”

Northern Rail, which serves Bradford on the Leeds-Bradford, Airedale and Wharfedale lines, has provided especially poor service. Since the new timetable was introduced, an average of 2.5% of trains have been cancelled, and 4.6% have operated in our region with fewer carriages than planned. On a typical day, about 100 to 200 passengers are left behind at stations in Yorkshire. They are stranded and are late for work and critical appointments that they need to get to. Unfortunately, despite the criticism that the train operating companies and the Department for Transport have come under since May, we have still not had a significant improvement in service levels. In fact, The Yorkshire Post found that rail punctuality is even worse now than it was in the immediate aftermath of the timetabling change. In November, only 62% of TransPennine Express services and 67% of Northern services arrived on time. Eight months on from the initial problems, it is shocking that the industry appears not to have got a grip on this issue. Passengers in Bradford and across Yorkshire have experienced almost a year of delays, cancellations and disrupted service. Despite that, fares continue to rise above inflation. It is simply not good enough; we deserve better.

As the Office of Rail and Road reported, the responsibility for the fiasco must be shared between the train operating companies, Network Rail and the Department for Transport. Each failed to prepare for the changes, and there was a clear lack of leadership at all levels.

It is also worth looking at the longer term causes of the crisis. There has been a persistent and longstanding underfunding of transport infrastructure in the north. As well as addressing the immediate problems with the performance of train operating companies, the Government must commit to revising the way that rail investment decisions are made. As a start, they should commit to working with Transport for the North to deliver Northern Powerhouse Rail as a priority. Bradford, like other towns and cities across the north, urgently needs that high-speed rail link to meet growing demand and fulfil our economic potential. It is only by investing in rail infrastructure, planning for future timetable changes and ensuring that passenger interests are at the heart of our rail system that we will prevent a repeat of the unacceptable service we have seen in recent months.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend referred to the work of the Transport Committee, which looked at timetabling and rail infrastructure investment. Does she share my concern that, according to the figures for the national infrastructure and construction pipeline, planned spending on transport per capita in Yorkshire is set to be the lowest of all the regions? It was not only lower in the past, but will be lower in the future—in 2017-18 and 2020-21?

[Judith Cummins]

I share my hon. Friend’s concern, and we all share her outrage.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew Jones]

I am always available for colleagues and am happy to arrange meetings. I know that engineering work is going on around the Christmas period this year, and I shall be going to see it. That is affecting the possibility of running Boxing day trains this year; but let us look to the future. I am happy to meet the hon. Gentleman.

We shall shortly run out of time for debate, and I want to spend a moment looking ahead. I gently remind colleagues who talk about a lack of investment in the north that although I have some sympathy as to investment, a little caution is required in taking snapshots of figures. The figures for London reflect Crossrail, but analysis of the Infrastructure and Projects Authority figures for planned central Government spending on transport infrastructure in the four-year period we are now in—from 2017 to 2020—shows that the northern regions will have a higher spend than the southern ones.

[Lilian Greenwood]

Will the Minister give way?

[Andrew Jones]

I am going to run out of time in a minute.

[Lilian Greenwood]

On that point, please.

[Andrew Jones]

My goodness—go on then.

[Lilian Greenwood]

I thank the Minister for giving way. The point is important, because he talks about the northern regions, but this debate is about Yorkshire. As I said earlier, Yorkshire and Humber is set to receive the lowest level of spending of any region, according to his figures, at £726 per head compared with £1,026 in London and £1,139 in the south-east. It is much less than the spending in the north-west and west midlands, which will alter the figures. Yorkshire and Humber is losing out.

[Andrew Jones]

That was a repetition of the point that the hon. Lady made earlier, so I do not need to address it.

I gently remind hon. Members that we had a zero-growth franchise, which was put in place by the Labour party, and we are playing catch-up on under-investment. Labour Members may say that Labour invested steadily when it was in government, but the evidence is the exact opposite. We had a zero-growth franchise and are catching up from it. Let me consider what that catch-up might look like.

Although 2018 is clearly a year that passengers in the north would wish to forget, we should not overlook the fact that train services in the region will be changing fundamentally. A significant amount of investment will bring passenger benefits. On the infrastructure side, the electrification between Manchester and Preston, which I mentioned earlier, was finally energised last week and the first test trains are now operational. [Interruption.] It will benefit services across the north. That is my point. Electric passenger services will be phased in during the spring. Across the region platform lengthening is under way. Of course I recognise that performance is not good enough, and that is why we have made a change in the control period 6 budgets and priorities. Under CP6 there will be a budget of £48 billion. That covers the period from 2019 to 2024. The priority was moving away from enhancements to catching up on core reliability—the maintenance of the network.

[Andrew Jones]

If I get time I shall come on to the trans-Pennine upgrades, but the core purpose of the CP6 investment, which is a record from any Government in British history, is to increase reliability and punctuality.

The key thing that passengers will notice is new trains. New rolling stock will come in on Northern, TransPennine Express and London North Eastern Railway networks in the coming months, including the removal of Pacers by the end of 2019. By this time next year the vast majority of the 500 brand new carriages committed by Northern and TPE will have been delivered, and the remainder will have been completely refurbished. TPE will have introduced its new Nova trains on the north trans-Pennine route and all the Pacers will be gone from Northern. There will be more services to add to those already delivered, especially at weekends; there will also be later last trains in the evenings and earlier first trains on Sundays. Elsewhere, LNER will begin introducing its new Azuma trains next year.

The trans-Pennine upgrade is a huge Government initiative—a £2.9 billion upgrade covering York to Leeds and Manchester. It is one third of the expected rail upgrade investment in the next control period, so it is a significant point. By the way, freight has been mentioned, and it is of course still under our consideration for northern trans-Pennine.

[Lilian Greenwood]

Will the Minister give way?

[Andrew Jones]

No, because I am running out of time. I have 50 seconds left.

We have a trans-Pennine upgrade that is bigger than anything ever considered or delivered by Labour. We are delivering it for the north in a way that has never been considered before.

Northern Powerhouse Rail, which some have called Crossrail for the north, is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. The scheme is being developed for the north by the north—by Transport for the North—and the Government have given a budget to help it to do that. Crossrail in London was mentioned as if money were piling into it. The money that has gone into Crossrail was, of course, a loan. Transport for London needed that loan to help it deliver the project. It was not a grant.

Of course, it is fair to say that rail services across Yorkshire and the north as a whole have not been good enough. That is entirely understood, but I want to leave colleagues in no doubt that we recognise the importance of the Yorkshire rail network and that steps are being taken to improve it. More than that, I hope that in a year’s time passengers will be able to experience the change as investment comes on stream, and the benefits to match our vision for a 21st century railway in Yorkshire.