Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, if she will make a comparative assessment of trends in the level of delay and cancellations by rail companies nationalised in 2025 a) before and b) after nationalisation.

Public ownership is not a silver bullet, but it is a vital step towards rebuilding trust and pride in our railways. Due to seasonal variations and the impact of things like service level changes and introduction of new rolling stock, it will take time for the impact of public ownership to be fully reflected in performance trend data. The Department expects all operators, both public and private, to deliver good performance for passengers. However, recent data published by the Office of Rail and Road shows that overall reliability is higher for operators currently in public ownership than for private sector operators contracted by the Department.

Data on rail performance and other industry statistics is available on the Office of Rail and Road data portal: https://dataportal.orr.gov.uk/.