Transpennine Express boss apologises for poor services (BBC)

[InkyScrolls]

"Transpennine, which operates across the North of England and into Scotland, has been cancelling trains on a daily basis for months, disrupting many journeys.

"Calls have been made for the company to lose its contract for the service.

"Matthew Golton, managing director of Transpennine, told the BBC the operator had a "recovery plan" to do better.

"The government has previously said action will be taken if the company "can't be turned around"."

Transpennine Express boss apologises for poor services

The head of Transpennine Express admits services have not been good enough in recent months.

www.bbc.co.uk

It's good to see someone in government has finally noticed the shambles that is TPE; will it lead to a positive outcome? Given the DfT is to a great extent responsible, I doubt it.

(Edited to comply with forum rules.)

 

[zwk500]

This feels very much like being apologised for getting kicked. But he can't tell people what the real problem is because that'd make his paymasters look bad.

 

[thelongestroad]

I love how the government literally controls everything to do with TOCs but still has the gall to blame the same TOCs to be seen to be on the "side of the people" when it all goes wrong.

 

[Solent&Wessex]

This feels very much like being apologised for getting kicked. But he can't tell people what the real problem is because that'd make his paymasters look bad.

In fairness, BBC Look North (Yorkshire version) had a more lengthy interview with the MD where he did allude to the fact that Aslef said that the rate of pay offered for a new Rest Day Working agreement wasn't high enough, and when quizzed by the interview why he just didn't offer the old rates again he did mention the DfT and that all agreements have to be authorised by them and that the DfT had given a mandate only for the rates he had offered Aslef.

 

[Andyh82]

A rare event that the Transpennine woes actually made it on the national BBC News tonight, it’s usually only London operators that make the national news

 

[Ashley Hill]

Perhaps employ enough drivers so as not to rely on rest day working.

 

[LLivery]

A rare event that the Transpennine woes actually made it on the national BBC News tonight, it’s usually only London operators that make the national news

I would've said Northern, ScotRail and Avanti have been on the national news far more than anything down here

 

[306024]

I would've said Northern, ScotRail and Avanti have been on the national news far more than anything down here

Indeed, because down here isn’t too bad by comparison. Southeastern were quoted on the BBC 22.00 news in the cancellation statistics too, but elsewhere on this forum it has been stated poor infrastructure performance has recently affected Southeastern.

Also mentioned, almost in passing, was this nonsense that cancellations declared by 22.00 the previous day do not count in the figures. First time I’ve heard this mentioned in the national media.

 

[Andyh82]

They should have made more of that P coding con and challenged the MD on the process

 

[d70g]

They should have made more of that P coding con and challenged the MD on the process

It's the ORR that permit P coding per performance stats. ToCs would also argue that it gives some kind of certainty for next day travel. Agreed that it's a loophole, however.

 

[mike57]

As an (ex mainly) TPE customer all I can say is 'A plague on all your houses' None of the participants in the whole sorry saga are blameless. My prediction is TPE will be stripped of the franchise, if only so that the government can be seen to be doing something. Will it do any good, I dont know. If you look at Northern v TPE since May 2018, which is when all the problems in the rail services in the north started (or at least became visible to the customers) then Northern have made some progress, TPE are as dire as ever. I am not sure if that is owing to Northern being OLR run or luck.

As a customer/taxpayer what I need is a reliable service, i.e. barring external unforseens the timetabled trains will run. The service may not be as frequent as I would like, but TPE have plenty of rolling stock so there is no excuse for 3 car units on core routes with a reduced timetable. By timetabled I dont mean use of P codes, thats just a cop out to milk the customer/taxpayer, I mean a proper deliverable timetable that I can plan a trip a few days in advance.

As for the apology, words are cheap, will changes to operating practices be made which have been highlighted on here as contributing to the poor service. The cynic in me says no, and I would imagine some members of the senior management will be dusting off their CVs whilst waiting for the inevitable.

What I find sad is that prior to May 2018 we had an OK service, yes there was overcrowding, but you could usually get where you needed to go in a timely manner.

 

[dk1]

After all this time I found it quite cringing to listen to & not particularly sincere.

 

[Clarence Yard]

As an (ex mainly) TPE customer all I can say is 'A plague on all your houses' None of the participants in the whole sorry saga are blameless. My prediction is TPE will be stripped of the franchise, if only so that the government can be seen to be doing something. Will it do any good, I dont know. If you look at Northern v TPE since May 2018, which is when all the problems in the rail services in the north started (or at least became visible to the customers) then Northern have made some progress, TPE are as dire as ever. I am not sure if that is owing to Northern being OLR run or luck.

As a customer/taxpayer what I need is a reliable service, i.e. barring external unforseens the timetabled trains will run. The service may not be as frequent as I would like, but TPE have plenty of rolling stock so there is no excuse for 3 car units on core routes with a reduced timetable. By timetabled I dont mean use of P codes, thats just a cop out to milk the customer/taxpayer, I mean a proper deliverable timetable that I can plan a trip a few days in advance.

As for the apology, words are cheap, will changes to operating practices be made which have been highlighted on here as contributing to the poor service. The cynic in me says no, and I would imagine some members of the senior management will be dusting off their CVs whilst waiting for the inevitable.

What I find sad is that prior to May 2018 we had an OK service, yes there was overcrowding, but you could usually get where you needed to go in a timely manner.

TPE isn’t a franchise - it’s a management contract. It ends in May 2023, unless it is extended, which it now probably won’t be. At that point OLR will just take over with the new contract.

Since 2020 the decisions about the timetable offer and number of units deployed has not rested with the TOC. The DfT has operated a strict cost control regime and that continues to affect the resources that can be deployed. This happens all over the network, not just in the North.

The train crew situation at March 2020 has largely determined what has happened since, irrespective of the TOC. If you had plenty of crew then, you would probably be alright now. If you didn’t (as was the situation at TPE), you would be struggling. COVID, the reluctance of the DfT to authorise extra recruitment and training at an earlier stage and the now the pay and RDW dispute all come into play here.

Basically TPE is a basket case unless some serious money is put in to solve some of the structural issues, something that the DfT has been reluctant to do. However, if you do OLR it, the money you save in management fees to FG could be released and then combining it with Northern may release some more of that required money.

MG was on the telly last night and he looked an old man. He will have no trouble picking up another MD’s job. But I suspect he won’t want to be in one where his hands have been so tied.

 

[mike57]

MG was on the telly last night and he looked an old man. He will have no trouble picking up another MD’s job. But I suspect he won’t want to be in one where his hands have been so tied.

With any job you can reach a point where you just walk, because any other action will leave you exposed in some way or another, Its not an action to take lightly but sometimes its actually better than having the job drag you under.

 

[td97]

It seems that on some days, TPE cancelled 45% of services, and generally cancellations seem to have increased throughout January. An apology seems hard to swallow when the service is still declining.

https://twitter.com/helenpidd/status/1618295709111025664?t=M6gcMJNz8F8F0mS4j1fZZA&s=19

 

[DarloRich]

I heard this on the radio yesterday evening and my response, particularly to the apology about poor service and high numbers of cancellations, was no $hit Sherlock!

BTW Have we not already had a TPE "recovery" plan? What letter of plan is this one and when will improvements start to be seen by passengers?

PS - we all know much of this is down to the DfT/Treasury/Tories - when will they apologise for thier poor service?

 

[josh-j]

Perhaps employ enough drivers so as not to rely on rest day working.

Up to the government to change that, though I think? That's the problem - the government is in charge of all this, the companies have very little freedom to change anything, then the government blames TPE et al, maybe give the contract to someone else, nothing changes but we all blame the "company of the day" and miss the fact that the government is running the rail network into the ground.

 

[Some guy]

Even an OLR would struggle with TPE it’s a sinking ship and has been since may. Especially with the government being as stubborn as a mule. The only light at the end of the tunnel would be the rest day working agreement back in place but even then it’s not good enough they need to rely on people working their days off

 

[Frankfurt]

Even an OLR would struggle with TPE it’s a sinking ship and has been since may. Especially with the government being as stubborn as a mule. The only light at the end of the tunnel would be the rest day working agreement back in place but even then it’s not good enough they need to rely on people working their days off

I don't think Aslef will sign off a RDW agreement anytime soon until bigger dispute is sorted.

 

[Tetchytyke]

TPE were unlucky with the timing of Covid, but all of TPE's woes can be traced back to the unfathomable decision to order and implement three entirely different new types of train at exactly the same time.

I still don't understand what they were thinking.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Up to the government to change that, though I think? That's the problem - the government is in charge of all this, the companies have very little freedom to change anything, then the government blames TPE et al, maybe give the contract to someone else, nothing changes but we all blame the "company of the day" and miss the fact that the government is running the rail network into the ground.

The NRCs work by the DfT specifying the services they want and the operator telling DfT how much it will cost. TPE receives the 2nd highest subsidy per passenger carried, Northern is top, but i would say there is very big question mark over what the travelling public has received for that expenditure. Services were pulled to allow driver training on new stock only for them to change the gameplan about what is deployed where creating whole lot more training. Andy Burnham also called out both Northern and TPE earlier in the week as underminng the economy of Northern cities from their failure to deliver a reliable service to put pressure on DfT.

The issue though is whether TPE have a credible recovery plan and a first step is to publish and DfT to enlist some knowledgeable railway folk to review its adequacy and deliverability and then use that as a basis to determine if they are on the road to a better outcome or not. If not give it to OLR although that will just give them an excuse to say they need 18-24mths to sort things out so aint going to be a quick fix.

 

[YorksLad12]

TPE were unlucky with the timing of Covid, but all of TPE's woes can be traced back to the unfathomable decision to order and implement three entirely different new types of train at exactly the same time.

I still don't understand what they were thinking.

They were probably thinking that they had to deliver on the step-change in seating that they'd promised when winning the franchise. With hindsight, they could have waited a bit, not ordered the Mk5a coaching stock and got more 802s as the production line cleared. I won't blame them for taking a decision with the best information they had (or any of us would had).

As I understand it, where management of the day went wrong was in offering a Rest Day Working agreement that offered a premium, so they could get the driver training sorted. The outsourced OLR has its hands full with the three former franchises it's already managing, I doubt it could take on TPE as well, even if evrything else was running smoothly.

 

[DanBlanchflowe]

It's the ORR that permit P coding per performance stats. ToCs would also argue that it gives some kind of certainty for next day travel. Agreed that it's a loophole, however.

The travelling public deserve to have announced the REAL reason why their train has been cancelled.
The DfT should instruct Mr Golton never to use “due to short notice change to the timetable”.
Today I was at Newcastle where this announcement has infected Northern services including 13.40 to Nunthorpe & 14.33 to Carlisle!!

 

[sheff1]

Perhaps employ enough drivers so as not to rely on rest day working.

Comical Matthew said "We've not got a shortage of drivers".

About time someone explained to him that, if a full service needs rest day working/overtime, he has not got enough drivers.

 

[zwk500]

Comical Matthew said "We've not got a shortage of drivers".

About time someone explained to him that, if a full service needs rest day working/overtime, he has not got enough drivers.

Isn't the problem driver training, not driver numbers (Similar to Avanti?)

 

[sheff1]

Isn't the problem driver training, not driver numbers (Similar to Avanti?)

He just said that there was not a shortage of drivers. The ASLEF gen sec said TPE had more than enough capacity to do any training required without the need for overtime.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

As I understand it, where management of the day went wrong was in offering a Rest Day Working agreement that offered a premium, so they could get the driver training sorted. The outsourced OLR has its hands full with the three former franchises it's already managing, I doubt it could take on TPE as well, even if evrything else was running smoothly.

LNER runs itself and lets be honest SE was fine as well it got taken over because of the fact it cooked the books over HS1 and Shapps wanted to play the big man. TPE is in desperate need of being sorted out and mist logically now it needs to be merged with Northern and Rail North Partnership be given a hand in getting it sorted out.

 

[VauxhallNova]

Some long term critics of TPE will perhaps be feeling that the chickens have come home to roost.

TPE were unlucky with the timing of Covid

The management team were extremely relieved to be out of the prior contract and onto a new, "risk free" arrangement. They thought that it had bought them a get out of jail free card for the driver training backlog.

 

[Parjon]

Could be a poor choice of phrase there, should Helen Pidd's digging surface any inappropriate disbursal of public money in exchange for any misleading picture of performance due to P coding.

 

[Gerald Fiennes]

Transfer to DOR is not going to help if there isn't a way forward on the RDW Agreement or, indeed, drivers pay as a whole. DOR are not going to be able to magic up drivers any faster than TPE can today, surely? So it's stalemate, until a way forward nationally is found on the ASLEF action. It really does now require some decisive leadership on everyone's part: Government, FTPE, ASLEF and RMT to get anywhere.