Railways Bill
● This Government’s bold vision for the railways will see the delivery of legislation to create a unified and simplified rail system that relentlessly focuses on improving services for passengers, delivering better value for money for taxpayers and, ending years of fragmentation and waste.
● Our railways are essential in ensuring reliable, affordable and accessible transport, which works for passengers and supports our economy. The rail sector and its supply chains support more than 240,000 jobs and generate wide economic benefits by connecting people and places.
● Unlocking the full potential of the railways is essential to growing the economy and lowering emissions from transport. The Government's plan will deliver those benefits, with the railways playing a central role in our growth mission and the country's national renewal.
What does the Bill do?
● The Government will put our rail system back on track to deliver for passengers and support our growth mission, with clear strategic direction and proper integration and coordination. We will ensure our railways deliver against six key objectives: reliable, affordable, efficient, quality, accessible and safe travel. This legislation will deliver the changes we need in the following ways:
o public ownership: The initial Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill will put passengers back at the heart of rail services by enabling us to bring contracts into public ownership as they come to an end or if operators fail to meet their commitments. This Bill will make further legislative changes to comprehensively reform our rail sector – bringing track and train back together and planning services on a whole-system basis, to better deliver for passengers and freight customers, and to unlock growth.
o greater leadership: Bringing together the management of the network and the delivery of passenger services into a single public body, Great British Railways (GBR). This new body will act as a "directing mind", with a relentless focus on delivering for passengers and freight customers.
o delivery for passengers: We will put passengers back at the heart of the railways and introduce new measures to protect their interests. This will include paving the way for a powerful new passenger watchdog, the Passenger Standards Authority, to independently monitor standards and champion improvement in service performance against a range of measures.
o simpler tickets: GBR will reform the ticketing system, to make it simpler for passengers, drive innovation across the network, replace the current ticket types and maximise passenger growth GBR will also ensure that ticketing innovations like automatic compensation, digital pay-as-you-go and digital season ticketing are rolled out across the whole network.
o support for freight operators: There will be a statutory duty on GBR to promote the use of rail freight, alongside an overall growth target set by the Secretary of State. The Government will include safeguards to ensure that freight operators continue to receive fair access to the network.
o role of open access: Open access has a proven track record in driving competition and better passenger outcomes, and wherever there is a case that open access operators can add value and capacity to the network, as assessed by the Office for Road and Rail, they will be able to.
● While primary legislation is required to initiate the change to public ownership and establish GBR, this Government will begin delivering improvements for passengers and freight users straight away. This includes setting up a "shadow
GBR" to unite key industry bodies in collaboration ahead of the formal establishment of GBR and establishing a new approach to industrial relations.
Territorial extent and application
● The Bill will extend and apply GB-wide.
