MPs blast ministers' handling of ‘broken’ rail franchising system

MPs have attacked the Government’s "completely inadequate" management of two major rail franchises as exposing a “broken model" with “serious and deep-rooted problems”.



The Public Accounts Committee said an “appalling level of delays” on some of the country’s biggest networks led to a “totally unacceptable state of affairs” and caused “misery” for passengers.

They said the Thameslink, Southern and Great Northern franchise had at one point presided over less than two thirds of trains arriving on time.

The committee said the department must ensure providers, who received the contracts in 2014, aligned their interests with those of customers in future bids.

The group also criticised the handling of trade union disputes, in the case of Thameslink, which they said had seen ministers fail to foresee the potential impact of strikes.

Their report added that although the department tried to "heap blame on the unions", their own decisions and "lack of constructive engagement have played a large part in the dismal service for passengers".

And they hit out at the move to set the level of fines Govia Thameslink will pay for future poor performance before knowing how they were performing.

Elsewhere they took aim at the East Coast franchise, of which they said the Government had “for a third time” allowed to promise more than it could deliver.

They said ministers had to take “urgent action” to understand why passenger demand changes and to consider it when handing out franchises in future.

And the committee said the problems surrounding rail services had sparked wider concerns on the Government's ability to manage contracts.

Meg Hillier, the chair of the Public Accounts Committee, said the Thameslink, Southern and Great Northern franchise has been a “multi-faceted shambles” causing “untold misery” for passengers, while East Coast has failed through “wildly inaccurate” passenger growth forecasts.

“In both cases the Government appears to have seen its task as simply to contract out the service, with wholly inadequate consideration given to passengers’ best interests and behaviour, she said.

“This imbalance cannot continue. The franchising model is broken and passengers are paying the price.

“If taxpayers are to have any faith in Government’s ability to deliver an effective passenger rail network then it must conduct and act on a thorough review before any further franchises are awarded.

“At its heart should be new measures to embed the protection of passengers’ interests at a contractual level – and to ensure taxpayers’ interests are properly protected should franchisee performance break down.

“Govia Thameslink’s new train timetables kick in next month. This will be a critical test for the operator and we will be watching closely.”

Shadow Transport Secretary Andy McDonald said: “The committee’s findings confirm what Labour has been saying for years. The rail franchising model is on life support and is being ideologically propped up by a Tory government which has run out of ideas.

“It’s time Chris Grayling pulled the plug on this discredited and disintegrating system. It is now clear that public ownership is the only sensible option for the future of rail.”

A spokesperson for the DfT pushed back at the findings, saying the PAC had drawn up "an imbalanced report that fails to grasp the complexity of the situation".

They added: "Our franchising model already puts passengers and taxpayers first and has doubled the number of passengers using trains since privatisation reversed decades of decline and underinvestment under British Rail."