Railways: East Coast Main Line

Lord Adonis Excerpts

Thursday 27th November 2014 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Kramer]

My Lords, this is certainly not a monopoly situation. Quite a number of companies bid on these franchises across the UK. They all start from a level playing field and we consider them completely impartially. With regard to fares, I note that the new franchise operator proposes a 10% reduction of standard anytime fares on longer distances in May 2015.

[Lord Adonis (Lab)]

My Lords, as the Minister who created the East Coast company, I ask the Minister to join me in congratulating Karen Boswell and her fantastic staff at East Coast on providing a first-class public service since National Express left the public without any service on the east coast line five years ago. Can the Minister also confirm that, at 91%, East Coast has a record customer satisfaction rating for that franchise since its creation, and that the East Coast is also the most popular franchise long-distance operator in the country at present? Would she regard it as a failure if the new private operator did not equal or exceed those performance ratings in a year’s time?

[Baroness Kramer]

My Lords, I am absolutely delighted to join in the accolades for the staff at the door—they have done an outstanding job and we have always applauded them for it. As they transfer to the new company, I am sure that they will continue to do an outstanding job. They will be offered new training opportunities and new opportunities to develop professionally, which will be extremely exciting. Therefore I am delighted to congratulate them. I am also delighted that the new franchise offers the kind of investment that we want to see, improving service in so many ways, improving the existing rolling stock and bringing on new rolling stock, additional seats and new services—all those kinds of things. We absolutely need improvements in ticketing as well, which is important because of the many people who use the east coast line.