Question time for Powerhouse boss over rail chaos
FOLLOWING months of Northern Rail chaos – and after launching its campaign to battle for the north to get the transport deal it deserves – our sister paper the M.E.N. interviewed Northern Powerhouse minister Jake Berry.
The Rossendale and Darwen MP was short of time, but was grilled on the fiasco and what part he would play fixing it.
We tried to pin down whether he, or the government, would take any responsibility for the Northern saga.
Here’s the interview in full...
Q) Transport Secretary Chris Grayling has gone into quite a lot of detail about what went wrong with Northern Rail but we notice he is blaming Network Rail and Northern Rail. Is this not something the government and ministers should have known about and seen coming?
A) All I can say is Chris Grayling has been absolutely clear that Network Rail and Northern Rail took on this timetabling work, they didn’t flag any issues with the government, they said they were capable of doing it and the improvements would be seen across the network. That clearly hasn’t hap- pened and the government has set out a threepronged approached to this issue.
1) Setting up a public inquiry because we are absolutely clear that is a completely unacceptable level of service we are seeing across the network so we want to understand how this problem occurred and ensure it never happens again for northern commuters or anyone else in the country.
2) Chris Grayling, secretary of state and his department are in constant contact with network rail and northern rail and have asked them to put in a timetable immediately and look to as quickly as possible introduce the full timetabling changes in a controlled way over the next few months.
3) I think really importantly, and as an acknowledgement of how seriously the government takes this issue, they will come forward shortly with details of the announced compensation package because it’s quite right, in the way that people who were disrupted on Southern Rail last year demanded this sort of response from the government, that northern commuters are every bit as important as anyone commuting anywhere else in the country and it’s quite right that people who’ve had this terrible disruption have the opportunity to have some financial recompense.
Q) In terms of compensation who is going to pay for that? Jo Johnson was unable to give a clear response on whether the taxpayer would end up paying that bill.
A) As with all these things we have to wait for the detail to come forward but the Department for Transport thas been really clear haven’t they? That is if Northern Rail has been found to breach its franchising obligations, they will look very closely at what those breaches are and seek to make recovery where appropriate.
Q) Do you take any responsibility for what’s happened with Northern? Does the government - or you as the northern powerhouse minister - think that there’s anything that could have been done differently?
A) I think we’ll have to wait for the outcome of the independent inquiry, the independent inquiry is to show where responsibility should lie for this.
That’s really, really important because what I want northern commuters to realise, just like commuters who commute every single day from my constituency via Darwin to Manchester, is that these timetabling changes which are actually about improving both passenger numbers and frequency of trains, when fully implemented, this disruption caused by these changes simply cannot happen again.
It is completely unacceptable, you know people are suffering, they can’t go to work, they can’t get to school they can’t go to job interviews, they can’t study. So I think rather than at this stage seek to apply blame I think it’s important that the independent inquiry works out exactly what has gone on and we stop it ever happening again.
Q) But at the beginning of this interview didn’t you blame Network Rail and Northern Rail?
A) No, I didn’t blame them. What I said was that Northern Rail and Network Rail were responsible for the timetabling changes and they didn’t let the government know in advance that they thought there could be these problems. It’s for the enquiry to determine who in fact is responsible for this.
We are absolutely determined to work with them to bring this disruption to an end, to have a full inquiry and to ensure where passengers have suffered that they get some compensation for that.
Look, anyone like me who has lived and worked in the north of England for their entire life knows that, you know, we need investment in transport infrastructure and that’s why this government has set up transport for the north to come up with that plan and committed more money than any government in history to improve our transport infrastructure.
Q) Would you like to apologise to passengers for what they’ve experienced? Do you think as the Northern Powerhouse minister you should apologise?
A) I don’t think as the Northern Powerhouse minister I am directly responsible for whether the trains run on time.
I would say I am extremely sorry for the disruption that people have suffered, it should never have happened, it’s completely unacceptable it has and that’s why we are determined to set out a plan to ensure the disruption is brought to an end as quickly as possible and to a full independent inquiry to ensure this never happens again and where passengers are eligible for compensation that they receive compensation for the disruption they have suffered.