Rail firms should not be paid when trains run late, says Grant Shapps

[Jorge Da Silva]

Rail firms “should not be paid when they don’t run trains on time”, Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said today as new figures showed more than a third of services are late.

The Cabinet minister has ordered a shake-up of Britain’s rail system including making the main measurement of whether trains are on time that they arrive no later than one minute after the scheduled time — rather than five to 10 minutes under the old system.


The new figures showed just 64.7 per cent of trains were “on time” — with more than a third not — in the three months to June.


Under the new 60-second rule, four out of 10 trains run by South Western Railway were not on time, more than three out of 10 on Southeastern and nearly 30 per cent of Govia Thameslink Railway services.


New figures showed just 64.7 per cent of trains were 'on time' (PA Archive/PA Images)
Firms running long-distance services had even worse records, with just 41 per cent of London North Eastern Railway services in time, 45.5 per cent of Virgin Trains West Coast, and 63.5 for Great Western Railway.

Mr Shapps told the Evening Standard: “It’s embarrassing not to have trains running on time in a modern 21st-century country.”


He told rail chiefs at a meeting last week that punctuality of services must be their number one priority.

Mr Shapps is proposing that a new national body, possibly called “Rail for Britain”, should collect fares and then distribute the money based on priorities and performance of rail companies.
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/tra...refunds-for-delay-of-15-minutes-a4234441.html
He also believes the current system is too fragmented with Network Rail, responsible for track and signalling, and the train operating companies too often not “pushing” in the same direction.

He added that he was “amazed” that trains could be as late as 10 minutes and still be counted as on time.

Mr Shapps told Sky News: “We have ended up with a very dysfunctional and flawed system. They should not be paid when they don’t run trains on time.”

Susie Homan, director of planning, engineering and operations at the Rail Delivery Group, said: “There is more to do but over the last year, while we’ve added thousands of extra services, we’ve also seen train punctuality start to improve.”

Any thoughts? I like the idea of not giving train companies money for late trains and getting a separate organisation to distribute the money based on performance.

 

[DarloRich]

I like the idea of not giving train companies money for late trains and getting a separate organisation to distribute the money based on performance.

because, of course, that will improve everything! What it wont do is simply expand further the process of delay attribution and create more buck passing. No. Not at all.

 

[pdeaves]

The article doesn't say that, despite a super-congested system, 2/3 of trains managed to arrive on time.

 

[Jorge Da Silva]

The article doesn't say that, despite a super-congested system, 2/3 of trains managed to arrive on time.

Thats WITHIN 5 Minutes of scheduled time and 10 Minutes for Long Distance. In other words some trains can arrive 9 minutes late and be classed as on-time.

 

[Taunton]

Provided that the punctuality is measured at all connecting points along the line, rather than padding the schedule before the last stop, as the only measuring point, where it likely doesn't matter and often there's hardly anybody left on board anyway (I see Bidston-Wrexham still puts so much padding in before the final stop that the timetable shows the train arrival time at Wrexham is after it's due to leave on its return journey).

 

[CyrusWuff]

Thats WITHIN 5 Minutes of scheduled time and 10 Minutes for Long Distance. In other words some trains can arrive 9 minutes late and be classed as on-time.

Across the network as a whole, the Moving Annual Average for the New Performance Measure (i.e. punctuality at every station call) stood at 65.1% actual right time af the end of Period 5. This increases to 84.2% within 3 minutes, 91.3% within 5 minutes and 96.9% within 10 minutes.

Source: https://dataportal.orr.gov.uk/stati...y-at-recorded-station-stops-by-toc-table-365/

 

[OxtedSignaller]

Also a lot of the delays on the railway are caused by infrastructure problems for which the responsibility lies with state owned Network Rail.

 

[swt_passenger]

“Amazed” about 5 and 10 mins punctuality thresholds, despite that being the case throughout the last 20 years or so?

 

[Mikey C]

Nice political sloganeering, but hardly realistic.

First there's the argument about who's to blame, the operator or Network Rail. Or indeed which operator, as one operator's train being late or suffering mechanical failure may delay another operator.

Then what happens if the delay is caused by passenger action, e.g. illness or vandalism...

 

[Roast Veg]

The sub 3 minute delay could be improved, setting it at a 90% target would be challenging but make for good headlines.

 

[43074]

He clearly doesn't have a clue, delay attribution causes TOCs to pay out huge sums of money as it is - and likewise they get compensated by NR when it isn't their fault but then have to pay compensation to their fare paying customers anyway so it's lose lose for them anyway really.

Nothing to see here but populist politics I'm afraid, although I do wonder whether he is being briefed on this stuff or just spouting as and when...

In any case, 60% RT is pretty damn impressive on a network the size it is anyway. But those facts neither generate good journalism or votes.

 

[StaffsWCML]

Hopefully it should get rid of some of the incompetents and London NorthWestern would soon be bankrupt.

Given the recent performance of Abellio and First franchises, its begs the question as to why this idiotic government keep giving them more of the pie.

 

[gazzaa2]

Also a lot of the delays on the railway are caused by infrastructure problems for which the responsibility lies with state owned Network Rail.

And they can't account for tresspassers/fatalities etc.

If they were fined/not paid when trains are cancelled for staff shortages then it may make sure they have enough staff.

 

[trebor79]

I think penalising TOCs for a 1 minute delay sounds ridiculous. Really, does anyone care if their train is 1 minute late? It's within the dwell time for most station stops for goodness sake.
All this will do is drive fare increases as TOCs will have to recover the revenue somehow, so likely to reduce the number of advanced fares that are available.

The idea also sounds horribly complicated to implement, and a bit half-baked if I may say so. Fare revenue distributed "according to priority". What does that even mean? That a heavily subsidised route will be allocated fare revenue from a route that generates a surplus? Or something else? What will drive TOCs to improve journey quality and options if they aren't guaranteed to see the benefit of any uplift in ridership?
I think this is a bit of thinly disguised electioneering with little substance behind it.

 

[StaffsWCML]

If they were fined/not paid when trains are cancelled for staff shortages then it may make sure they have enough staff.

This is the key thing.

Train reliability issues and staffing issues absolutely should be the responsibility of the TOC. I think people are realistic about major outages, one off events, extreme whether conditions etc.

 

[bb21]

TOCs are already heavily penalised for poor performances in more recent franchise awards drawn up on targets set by clueless civil servants, but new government ministers have to leave their paw prints and be heard. If they don't have anything useful to say, they will just make empty statements like these.

Any exposure and publicity is a good one for the minister. Maximum visibility and zero responsibility.

I wouldn't pay any attention to it.

 

[Mag_seven]

Just some headline grabbing spin to deflect attention from the mess they are making of Brexit.

 

[MS805]

Thats WITHIN 5 Minutes of scheduled time and 10 Minutes for Long Distance. In other words some trains can arrive 9 minutes late and be classed as on-time.

But there has to be some kind of latitude, otherwise a TOC ends being responsible because of being stuck behind a train in the platform ahead at Manchester Piccadilly, which is over time because of an unexpected passenger in a wheelchair.

You can improve punctuality fairly easily if you increase station dwell times and margins at junctions etc., but you have to cancel lots of trains!

 

[pdeaves]

Maybe this 'proposal' (if it even is one, really) should be implemented only along side a similar one that does not pay MPs/civil servants each time a target is missed (final, real Brexit being the obvious newsworthy one but there are bound to be plenty of others).

 

[Polarbear]

Unfortunately, this statement has the hallmarks of political posturing rather than being a rational, well thought out idea. I'm all for improving punctuality, but whilst many of the causes of delays are outside the remit of TOC's, this doesn't seem to be a particularly good way of addressing the problem.

Yes, shortage of staff is down to the TOC, but infrastructure failures, trespass, fatalities, and weather related issues are all causes of delays which TOC's have no control over.

 

[EastCoastway]

I mean Delay Attribution right now is a lengthy and painful process that involves multiple people and despite having ''short'' timeframes to be able to settle things it is hard and costs ToC's alot. All this would do is put people off tendering for a franchise because one incident would cost them more than the amount it does now!

 

[Ianno87]

“Amazed” about 5 and 10 mins punctuality thresholds, despite that being the case throughout the last 20 years or so?

And more onerous than what many foreign railway systems are measured against.

 

[swt_passenger]

And more onerous than what many foreign railway systems are measured against.

Yes, we like to make a rod for our own back...

 

[Taunton]

Lots of discussion above about 5 or 10 minute delays on odd occasions, but a major, and apparently growing, issue, is the cancellation of services, especially out of the peak, late night, weekends, last trains, etc, much of which seems to be down to the staff agreements, or lack of them, and staff numbers, or likewise.

 

[hooverboy]

Any thoughts? I like the idea of not giving train companies money for late trains and getting a separate organisation to distribute the money based on performance.

that depends on the reason why it is late. Some hold ups can't be avoided.

ie a train with mechanical issues on a small line with a queue of other services behind it,with signallers having to re-path following services...who do you punish?
it's not the fault of the trains in the queue.

lack of train crew is a good enough excuse for penalties,ToC's shold have sufficient staff on standby to cover.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I'd rather see this based on something like Delay Repay, i.e. delayed passenger journeys. A penalty for simple delayed trains means connections won't ever get held.

 

[stj]

Maybe give them a bonus for being early otherwise times will just extend to reduce chances of trains being late.

 

[trebor79]

Maybe give them a bonus for being early otherwise times will just extend to reduce chances of trains being late.

Surely a bonus for being early would motivate slack timetables too?

 

[Ianno87]

I'd rather see this based on something like Delay Repay, i.e. delayed passenger journeys. A penalty for simple delayed trains means connections won't ever get held.

For that you'd need an accurate number of passengers on every train. Which is impossible.

Or would create perverse incentives - e.g. TOCs actively not promoting Delay Repay so people don't claim and it skews the statistics.

 

[ComUtoR]

For that you'd need an accurate number of passengers on every train. Which is impossible.

I believe that this is already being recorded. TOCs are required to record the 'loading data' 700s count passengers. There is a youtube video of it somewhere.