North Wales Assembly Member Mark Isherwood has called for a Ministerial Statement on rail services in North Wales after the delays and cancelled services suffered by rail-users.
Speaking in yesterday’ Business Statement, Mr Isherwood said rail-users are extremely concerned by the disruptive service in North Wales, and want answers.
He said:
“On Saturday I attended the Wrexham-Bidston Rail Users Association's Annual General Meeting, where the Chair referred us to Transport for Wales's Live Travel Updates on Saturday, which showed that, with the exception of ‘minor delays’ at Cardiff-Shrewsbury and Cardiff-Swansea, all the other South Wales services had ‘good service’, whereas Llandudno-Blaenau Ffestiniog and Chester-Crewe had ‘severe delays’, and Wrexham-Bidston had an ‘amended timetable’ - i.e. cancelled.
“Yesterday, the Executive Member for Transport at Wrexham wrote to the Cabinet Secretary here ‘You will be aware that following the decision by Transport for Wales last week, no train services operated on the Wrexham-Bidston line this weekend due to rail services in South Wales being supplemented due to a sporting fixture. No stakeholders here were consulted in advance or informed directly of this’, or then the decision over the weekend to rescind suspension and introduce a reduced timetable ‘again with no discussion with stakeholders’. We know that the Chair of Neston Transport Working Group, the other end of this line, on Friday e-mailed – ‘It has been Neston Town Council’s position for three years that the whole of the (Wrexham Bidston) line should be operated by Merseytravel – but, failing that, at least the section from Bidston to Shotton so that we can experience the high-quality services provided by them’.
“And on Friday, my office received a phone call from a rail insider, a whistleblower, who wished to remain anonymous, who told me that the majority of trains had been cancelled because no spares were available when the Welsh Government took over, and that the tooling and spares had been taken by Arriva. So, we need to know why these missing spares were not picked up and provided for by the incoming operator, and why the wheel lathes access was not put into place. Again, we heard on Saturday that there was access, belatedly, to Crewe, Bristol and Taunton. But we also know that the excuse for so many trains being off the line is because of shortage of wheel lathes. Is there a sustainable solution in place, or is this a one-off, and will this address the problem?
“I don't want a short response. I'm calling for a Ministerial Statement to this Assembly so that we can get to the bottom of these many questions being raised by very worried stakeholders.”
The Leader of the House replied: “We've got 10 per cent of that stock back in action. And in response to Andrew R.T. Davies, we did say that we'll arrange for Transport for Wales to have a weekly update for Members on the situation across Wales, and I'll make sure the Member is included in that, obviously.”
Mr Isherwood added: “As one rail traveller emailed ‘there were also furious passengers at Shotton debating what the wording meant on the electronic display but eventually worked out it meant ‘cancelled’. This is effectively a ‘leaf fall’ timetable without any consultation – whereas Arriva did consult about their proposals’. All these arrangements should have been put in place before Transport for Wales took over the Wales and Borders franchise last month. This lack of advance planning is a dereliction of duty which lands right at the door of the Cabinet Secretary for Economy and Transport, Ken Skates, himself.”
