Rail Timetabling

John Bercow Excerpts

Monday 4th June 2018 Commons Chamber

[Several hon. Members rose—]

[Mr Speaker]

Having heard the hon. Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) chuntering from a sedentary position, perhaps we can now hear him on his feet.

[Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)]

Thank you, Mr Speaker.

If someone conspired to break into my garage and steal or immobilise my car, they would face the full force of the law. The Secretary of State’s Department has conspired with the railway companies in an incompetent manner to change the timetables, and despite repeated warnings from the Opposition, the companies went ahead with it. When will they face the full force of having their franchises stripped from them, or when will he be brave enough to face up to this and resign?

--- Later in debate ---

[Huw Merriman (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

What a delicious choice: my former constituency chairman, the hon. Member for Horsham (Jeremy Quin), and an Arsenal fan behind him, most of whose family live in my constituency. I do not want to be unkind to Horsham, but it has got to be Huw Merriman.

[Huw Merriman]

Thank you, Mr Speaker—I’m always your man.

In the two years that the Secretary of State for Transport has been in post and I have sat on the Transport Committee, he has always been very honest, open and direct about the need for change. For any project management exercise to fail to get the sign-off from Network Rail and for it to find out only three weeks before, by which time it is too late to turn the oil tanker around, has got to be a spectacular failure. Who was the project manager and penholder for this exercise?

--- Later in debate ---

[Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Speaker]

People lower down the alphabet should not suffer discrimination. I call Kate Green.

[Kate Green]

These are not recent problems. They predate the introduction of the new timetable. They predate the delay in the infrastructure improvements, and I have been talking to the Secretary of State, in this Chamber and in private meetings, for month after month about the problems my constituents are experiencing. He says that he took advice from industry experts, and of course he should, but why did he not also take advice and ask questions based on the information coming from Members of this House and on the information from the travelling public that has been all over social media for months? What questions did he ask these industry experts?