Not in the area to have caught the local news this lunchtime but have since caught up, unsurprising to see West Midlands likely to become the next franchise to pursue DOO. Very carefully worded argument from the TOC stating they intend to have 2 people on board each train to fail to mention whether both will be safety critical. Feel for the employees deskilling and destaffing the rail industry for profit.
This issue is likely to come up every time a TOC orders new trains now. It seems to be DFT / rolling stock leasing company policy now that any new trains ordered have body side cameras fitted to them from the off.
So any TOC that orders new trains for anything other than intercity work with body side cameras fitted is going to bring up this issue.
I can only assume that London Midland planned to retain class 323s on Birmingham suburban work, supplemented by ex-Northern 323s, with extra 350(4)s on WCML services, retain 350/2s and class 230s on brand lines. All assumptions. However it probably would have meant they would have wished to (and would have had to) keep guards fully safety critical throughout and could offer guarantees fairly early on. And it probably wouldn't have been due to loyalty to their staff, but because they simply did not want to (assumption) order new trains.
Govia appear to be for DOO as much as any other TOC, and if it wanted to order new trains its a fair bet the issue would arise with them too, as it has at Southern. It just probably would have been that they didn't want to pay out for new trains, and so would have to continue operation as it is today.
So its a case of a TOC would need to commit to retain only its existing guard operated stock for the full duration of the franchise and they could then guarantee the role of the guard fully. Any orders for new train stock will activate a dispute as body side cameras seem to be fitted as standard now.