Okay, here goes...
An election in 2017 (after the Con-LD coalition implodes less than 2 years into their second term) sees a 'Traffic-light' coalition of Labour, the Greens and the few remaining Lib-Dems announce another raft of electrification schemes to follow on in CP6/7.
The 'IEP' trains begin to enter service on-budget(!) and just a few weeks later than planned, having had a few teething problems during testing. Virgin East Coast repaint a number of 91/Mk4 sets into 'heritage' liveries to promote a series of 'Farewell Tours' planned after a drunken meeting at the West Riding, Dewsbury between Sir Dickie Pickle and a group of RailUK Forum members doing the Pennine Ale Trail. 91001 (renumbered) gets 'Swallow' livery and it's matching name back; 91104 receives GNER colours but is named 'Ian Yeowart' after a dispute over the GNER brand; 91131 is given HST-style BR blue with 'Intercity 225' branding; and 91132 is given an improvised version of LNER green!
-The remainder however see out their days in EC silver, but with red Virgin swooshes at each end!
Hitachi win the contract to provide new stock for Merseyrail- with dual voltage provision for electrification (and joining where required) at 25kV OHLE of Ormskirk-Preston (including the south Burscough curve, which links into wiring of the Wigan-Southport line); Kirkby-Wigan (with passive provision for a Skelmersdale branch); Ellesmere Port-Helsby (and on to Runcorn, with Chester-Warrington also being wired); and Bidston to initially Shotton (High Level)- which sees a replication of the practice that's just being eliminated at Ormskirk & Kirkby!
A plan eventually emerges to upgrade
some of the Pacers to meet the post-2020 accessibility requirements. The 3-car 144s are refurbished similar to the plans which emerged in early 2013. The remaining 2-car units (23x143, 13x144) are merged into 4-car sets with the removal of 2 of the cabs, and fitted with one accessible toilet per 4-car set. The 17 new 'super-pacers' are classified as 145/1 for the sets formed of 143s and /2 for the 144s. The remaining odd set of each become spares donors. In early 2023 the possibility of redundant bi-mode IEP engines means the poor folk of Altrincham, Colne, Clitheroe, Denby Dale, Gainsborough, Marple and Stockton may have to suffer their still-rather-poor-especially-after-all-that-investment screeching and bouncing for another decade!
And finally, Huddersfield eventually regains services to the capital thanks to the dreaded Bi-mode IEP, but not to Kings Cross via the ECML. How? A dramatic upsurge in reliability of the GW-800s coupled with a drop in passenger numbers due to some economic nonsense means that several of the bi-mode sets become spare. In a joint venture between the Northern and East Midlands franchise holders, 1 daily return service starts between Huddersfield-Shepley-Denby Dale-Penistone-Barnsley-Meadowhell-Sheffield-fast to St. Pancras! With a journey time in the ball-park of 4 hours or more (not helped by the 10mph speed restriction for heavy stock on Longroyd Bridge viaduct) it doesn't attract much end-to-end custom though!
