Extract from committee
stage (Lords) (day 5) of the Illegal Migration Bill
(LD): My Lords, this is the
first of a number of proposed new clauses relating to the
efficiency of the Home Office and the elusive—maybe even
illusory—impact assessment statement. We know we will be told
that the impact assessment will be published “in due course”. The
timetabling may be clear to the Home Office but it is not to any
other noble Lord who has spoken. It occurred to me that the Home
Office could really teach even Avanti West Coast
or Transpennine
Express something about timetabling...
Extracts from
Westminster Hall debate on Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail
(Cleethorpes) (Con):...I
recognise that the private sector has not got it all right. There
are significant concerns today around particular services linked
to industrial action and rest-day working agreements. I was a
keen advocate for Transpennine Express
to lose its franchise and for the service to be taken under the
wing of the OLR until a new private operator could be found. But
colleagues across the House must look to pragmatic solutions to
fix the railways, with the private and public sector working
together. We need to create a market in which the private sector
can deliver for customers. We need to let customer-facing
operators act in the interests of the customer, not constantly
seek permission from the centre. That is not an ideological
argument, but one based on reality: command and control from the
centre is not helping the sector to bounce back after the
pandemic. If we get the balance right, a public-private
partnership will enable operators to deliver for customers...
(West Dorset) (Con):...In the
Bradshaw lecture mentioned by the Chair of the Transport
Committee, the Secretary of State described the railway system as
broken, and I agree with him. There are many reasons why it has
become so fractious. We have allowed the trade unions to have
much more influence than they should have. During covid, trade
unions told train companies they would not allow the training of
train drivers. That generated a deficit in the manpower
requirement, and it meant that many train companies—including
Transpennine
Express, I suspect, and many others—have to cope with
fewer train drivers than they require, and therefore have a
requirement on overtime. That has meant that the influence and
power was with the trade unions, particularly the train drivers’
union. We know that that is the case even today...
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