Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what steps her Department plans to take to help improve the Greater Western region after it is absorbed into Great British Railways.

This Government is committed to creating a unified and simplified railway that puts customers first, rebuilding trust and placing passenger operations under public ownership and control. Public ownership alone is not a silver bullet but a vital step towards wider reform to bring track and train together under Great British Railways (GBR).

The Railways Bill will establish GBR as a new ‘directing mind’ for the industry. It will bring track and train under one public body to improve services for passengers and freight customers. This will ultimately provide better value for taxpayers, by streamlining the rail sector and bringing together roles and responsibilities that are currently fragmented across multiple bodies and organisations.

Part of the planning for the transfer of train operating companies into public ownership, including Great Western Railway, is to identify cost effective actions to be taken to help deliver value for money, affordable improvements as we move towards GBR.