(Kingston upon Hull North)
(Lab):...I want to talk specifically about TransPennine
and First Hull Trains. Both companies are part of FirstGroup, which made millions in profit in
the last financial year. I will give some experiences of
passengers. The first reads:
“Happy Bank Holiday weekend, TransPennine Express. I’m sure we’ll
have a good one too when my husband eventually gets on your train
service from Leeds to Hull. He’s still sat on the platform. It’s
the fifth night in a row, and he has missed his son’s
bedtime.”
I have also had constituents write to me to say that they are
moving away from Hull because of the unreliability of the service
when they want to commute to Leeds. On overcrowding, which has
become an issue over the past year:
“If you want intimacy but you’re too scared to seek it out, take
a TransPennine Express train instead, and press yourself against
four strangers for two hours.”
TransPennine Express decided earlier this year as part of its
timetabling changes that it would increase the length of the
journey from Hull across to Manchester by adding four additional
stops. When questioned about this by the Hull and Humber chamber
of commerce, TransPennine apparently said that the
“timetable development will enhance connectivity to and from
Hull.”
It actually adds about 15 additional minutes to the journey.
There was no consultation or discussion—TransPennine just decided
to do this themselves. This does not fit with the northern
powerhouse—connectivity between the great cities of the north. It
should be reducing journey times, not increasing them.
When we three Hull MPs asked to meet Leo Goodwin, the head of
TransPennine Express who has a pay package of £360,000, he would
not. In fact, when we had the meeting with the chamber of
commerce, we empty-chaired him: we had a chair with his name on,
because he would not come and talk to us. We shamed him into
coming to explain to us why TransPennine had taken that
action. It is clear that there are cancellations and there is
late running, and people are being squashed in like sardines on
the service from Leeds.
In Hull, we feel like we are the end of the line and often
forgotten. We are not getting new trains; we are getting
refurbished trains as part of the TransPennine refurbishment
stock. The city of Hull does not have a direct train to
Manchester airport, but Scarborough—a small and important
town—does. We now have longer journeys across the Pennines due to
the changes that TransPennine made, and we do not have a direct
service from Hull to Liverpool—the area that we know is the spine
of the northern powerhouse.
I would like the Minister to respond to our requests. We think
that we should have a half-hourly additional express service from
Hull and a direct link to Manchester airport. I also want to
mention TransPennine Express, because it runs Hull station on
behalf of Network Rail. We have been voted the ninth-worst
station in the UK by Passenger Focus. We had £1.4 million spent
to improve facilities that were supposed to be for city of
culture in 2017, but which did not finish until 2018. We have
smaller waiting rooms, smelly toilets and gaffer tape over the
signage in the station. We have a Christmas tree that was put up
and then surrounded with bollards and hazard tape. The lack of
pride that TransPennine has in our station just beggars belief.
We have had no station manager for months; we have had remote
management from Huddersfield.
To read the whole debate, CLICK
HERE
