Rail Services

Louise Haigh Excerpts

Thursday 11th May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Louise Haigh (Sheffield, Heeley) (Lab)]

I thank the Secretary of State for advance sight of his statement.

After years of comprehensive failure, after tens of millions in taxpayer cash has been handed to an operator so clearly not fit for purpose, after needless damage has been wrought on the northern economy and more than six months after Labour demanded it, the Tories have finally accepted that they can no longer defend the indefensible. They have seen the writing on the wall, and the only question passengers will be asking today is: what stopped the Secretary of State taking action sooner? How on earth did it take this long?

Let us just be clear about the failure that, until now, has been allowed to go on unchecked. This operator has broken records for cancellations. Almost one in five services last year did not run and fewer than half the services were on time. It has been an issue not just for the last few months, as Ministers claim, but for years. Seven years ago—well before covid—TransPennine Express had exactly the same staff shortages it suffers from today. It failed to address the issues that passengers are still experiencing. That it managed to keep this contract for so long, and to be told only months ago that it was in line for an eight-year extension, is extraordinary.

The difficult truth for the Secretary of State today is this: his decision shines an unforgiving light on the fractured railways his party is responsible for. This endless cycle of private operators having to be taken over shows the rail system is fundamentally broken. The comprehensive failure of TransPennine Express is not a bug in the system; it is a feature of it. Since the Conservatives came to office, the east coast franchise has collapsed and been taken over, Northern Rail followed, and then London and Southeastern. For the Conservatives to have nationalised one railway may be regarded as misfortune; to have nationalised four demonstrates something much more fundamental. The privatised model they have rigidly lauded in the face of all evidence is collapsing. Passengers see services get visibly, demonstrably worse while hundreds of millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money is handed to shareholders without the faintest hint of competition. How much longer will people be asked to rely on a system that so routinely fails?

The Secretary of State’s decision today must just be the start. He now needs to show the leadership that has been so sorely lacking: the Government must stop casting around and blaming everyone but themselves. Will he set out to the House the immediate plan to address the long-standing issues of recruitment, training and rest day working? What steps is he taking to end the industrial dispute that has now been ongoing for over a year? Can he confirm when he last held talks with the employers and the unions to bring the dispute to an end? Strike action is imminent but he still has an opportunity to avoid it. Can it really be the case that he has not met the unions and the employers for more than five months? If that is correct it is a truly shocking dereliction of duty.

The Secretary of State’s decision today must be the start of something more fundamental. He can choose to continue with this charade, to entrench the fragmentation that his proposed reforms will deliver, or he can accept that he has been wrong and bring the remaining operators into public ownership. He can end this broken system that is failing passengers, bring track and train together, speed up fare reform and deliver a simpler, unified railway.

Today’s decision makes that case more obvious than ever. Services have never been worse, and for too long the Tories’ solution has been more of the same. The entire country should not have to put up with this for a second longer. It is time for fundamental change, and it is time to deliver the rail service that Britain deserves.