Train Services: Extreme Weather

Joe Morris Excerpts

Tuesday 3rd November 2026 Westminster Hall

[Joe Morris (Hexham) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure, as always, to serve under your chairship, Ms Jardine. I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Cannock Chase (Josh Newbury) for securing such an important—and, given the weather on Sunday, timely—debate. When the weather turns, the Tyne valley finds out very quickly how well looked after its railway has been over the years. Last Tuesday, for example, 20 services were cancelled across the Northern network because of Storm Boelo and the whole Carlisle to Newcastle line was disrupted.

I grew up in my constituency and know what the morning after a particularly rough bit of weather looks like: people get a message on their app saying “Cancelled” or see that message at the train station, they make an apologetic phone call to their boss or client, and they wait for news at home, in the station coffee shop or just hanging around under the shelter. But this is about far more than just one storm. Extreme weather is no longer the exception. Heavy rain, flooding, landslips, high winds and extreme heat are all hitting the safe and reliable running of services, and climate change is the driving cause, as has been said.

The problem is that our railway was not built for this. Most of our infrastructure is of Victorian origin. Around 90% of Network Rail’s assets in my constituency were installed before the year 2000. Our rails are stressed. We exceeded the standard operating limit of around 30° in 2022. Track has been recorded at 51°. The July 2022 heatwave alone cut performance by 40% to 50% and cost £30 million in lost revenue in a single week. We have seen that replicated every year since. The result is buckled track, sagging wires and failing embankments.

Those are the headlines, but behind each disruption is a personal story. In Haltwhistle, closure of the line turns hospital appointments into an ordeal. In Haydon Bridge or Bardon Mill, it means people potentially losing out on a day’s work. In Corbridge, Riding Mill or Stocksfield, it means commuters being forced on to roads that could be flooded or blocked. In Prudhoe or Wylam, it means people being forced on to a bus that carries a fraction of what a train can. Rural lines like those in my constituency feel it first, and feel it worst. Cities have other routes. In the Tyne valley, when the railway goes, all that is left is the A69, which immediately becomes congested.

I want to add to the weather problem the trains problem. I recently wrote to Northern about the lack of capacity between Hexham and Newcastle and across the west of my constituency, including the absence of extra trains when Newcastle United are playing at home. It is hard to square the aspiration of a modern, passenger-focused railway with the fact that predictable surges in demand are managed by existing timetables. Northern has been candid with me that too much of the fleet is approaching the end of its operational life and needs ever more repair. Those units become unavailable unexpectedly because Northern runs many different types of train and not all are compatible with all routes, which limits its ability to move units around to strengthen services.

I am grateful for that honesty, but thinking it through again, when a storm hits and units fail, there is no spare train and no flexibility. An old fleet and an old network are asked to cope with a climate that neither was designed for. That is what 14 years of putting off tough decisions looks like to rural communities in my constituency, some of which face extensive difficulties even getting to the central train line. In Bellingham, Slaggyford, Knarsdale, Allendale or up in Stamfordham, an unreliable local bus that has been cut by the Morpeth Conservatives often does not arrive on time or at all.

I welcome the Government bringing the railway back into public hands and the new trains programme—the Minister is aware of my enthusiasm for that—but the structures are not resilient. Let me put a few challenges to the Minister. First, we need sustained investment in resilience rather than simply repair. We cannot answer extreme weather with more cancellations and permanent reliance on precautionary speed restrictions. Will he look at longer-term funding for renewals and maintenance so that the embankments, drainage and track are built for the climate that we have now and the one that is coming over the hill?

Secondly, we need safety and reliability together. The choice is not between accepting disruption and taking risks. Train drivers see and tell me of ageing infrastructure and extreme weather at first hand. Their experience must be part of how we plan for the decades ahead. Will the Minister make sure that it is?

Thirdly, we need spare capacity. Will the Minister press Northern on how the new trains programme will give the Tyne valley the flexibility to respond when something goes wrong—and when something goes right, like when there is a full stadium on a Mags or Newcastle Red Bulls match day?

Fourthly, we need a plan for the day if it goes wrong. We need proper replacement services, early and honest information, and a recovery plan in place for rural lines before the storm, rather than my constituency feeling like it is consistently improvised after the fact.

There is a bigger argument too: if we wish to hit our climate goals we need to get more people and more freight on to rail. Domestic transport accounts for 30% of our territorial greenhouse gas emissions and road vehicles represent around 90% of that figure. Rail is a fraction of that. A single freight train could replace up to 129 lorry movements. We cannot ask people to switch to rail and give them a railway that falls over at the first sign of trouble. The people of the Tyne valley and my constituency more broadly are not asking for luxury; they are simply asking for a railway that works when the weather does not.