Lord Clark of Windermere
Main Page: Lord Clark of Windermere (Labour - Life peer)Department Debates - View all Lord Clark of Windermere's debates with the Department for Transport
(6 years, 1 month ago)
Lords ChamberMy Lords, I certainly agree with the noble Baroness on that. Part of the problem is the increasing demand from passengers travelling into London on our railways. We want to ensure that the CrossCountry service continues to provide other options for passengers so that they do not have to travel into central London.
When the CrossCountry franchise is considered, will the Government ensure that the company winning the bid has sufficient trains and, more importantly, sufficient drivers and guards to run those trains, unlike Northern in Cumbria?
My Lords, as I said before, one of the things we will be expecting the new franchise operator to deliver is more rolling stock, to deal with overcrowding. I say from recent experience that we will be looking closely at the train drivers that it has available.