Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, whether she has made an assessment of the potential impact of the contractual regime for Sunday working for train conductors in the North West; and what steps she plans to take to ensure that Sunday services are adequately staffed.

Sundays currently fall outside of the working week for 95 per cent of Northern’s conductors in the North-West, making the service reliant on staff volunteering to work their days off.

This is a key contributing factor to the unacceptably high levels of cancellations passengers are suffering on a Sunday. The Secretary of State and Rail Minister have both met Northern, and great efforts are going into solving the long-standing industrial relations issues and disputes that we been left with by the previous government, which are at the root of the problems with Sunday train services in the North-West.