EVERY SATURDAY

THE EXTENT to which MPs are whipped into line was evident this week when Parliament debated a vote of no confidence over Chris Grayling’s mishandling and mismanagement of the railways.

I counted – at one point – just four Tory backbenchers in the Commons. In fairness, there might have been a couple more who were sitting in some of the more secluded spots of Parliament.

Yet, when it came to the crunch vote, 305 Conservative MPs voted down the Labour motion and, in doing so, effectively said that they had every confidence in Mr Grayling’s capabilities and that he was doing a good job. Seriously? Perhaps the North’s Tory MPs will go public and write in defence of the Transport Secretary now more than 11,000 trains have been cancelled or seriously delayed here.

With a majority of 20 votes, Skipton and Ripon MP Julian Smith – the Government’s Chief Whip – will, doubtless, be very pleased that he spared Theresa May and the Government from an embarrassing defeat.

He shouldn’t be. This issue – which now includes emails from Department for Transport officials dismissing rail routes here as ‘valueless’ – is hurting the Tories in the North and he, as the Government’s business manager, should be very concerned.

After all, the cancellation of services by under-fire operator Northern will continue until at least November despite the DfT, and rest of the rail industry, appearing to be aware at least two years ago that the recent timetable changes would lead to unprecedented disruption.

The best Rail Minister Jo Johnson – Mr Grayling’s deputy – could manage in the Commons was this: “The cancellation of services is now progressively more and more planned by Northern as it seeks to stabilise the timetable and to ensure that the travelling public can plan their journeys with greater assurance.”

This is political-speak for managed chaos. And then there’s Northern Powerhouse Minister Jake Berry who is equally ineffectual. Asked by Hull North MP Diana Johnson about what he’d been doing, he simply listed a number of media appearances.

Sorry, it’s about the actual ‘doing’ and, on this, Mr Berry – the Minister for the North – has said absolutely nothing because, presumably, he, too, is among those who simply waits to take their orders from Julian Smith on how to vote.

IF THE Government won’t listen to

and others over ‘Failing Grayling’, and ‘Northern Fail’, perhaps they’ll heed these comments after emails revealed at Prime Minister’s Questions effectively dismissed Northern rail services as “valueless”.

Leeds City Council chief executive Tom Riordan tweeted: “This is the low water mark in the confidence of the North in Whitehall. I’ve worked there and it’s full of intelligent good people. But too many times the culture and system defaults towards the ‘provinces’ being secondary and ‘valueless’. Only answer is to move powers North. #OneNorth.”

And his Doncaster counterpart Jo Miller put the exchanges at PMQs in the context of devolution: “I’m sick and tired of decisions being made in Whitehall by people who don’t understand and don’t often care. The North deserves better and #Yorkshire deserves better. Now. That’s why #oneyorkshire matters.”

I agree.

YOU COULDN’T make it up. Even though none other than Chris Grayling ‘officially opened’ the new section of the A1M in North Yorkshire on May 18, the work appears to be far from complete.

Richmond MP Rishi Sunak – a Communities Minister – has written to Highways England, whose chief is ostensibly Mr Grayling, to complain about the state of the approach roads and roundabouts at the Scotch Corner and Catterick junctions and how this could hit tourism traffic.

“The Scotch Corner junction is still a morass of closed-off lanes, seemingly endless lines of cones and temporary signs,” he bemoaned.

Bad news. Highways England tells me the roadworks will not be completed until the end of July. At least Mr Sunak is better placed than most to tell the Transport Secretary to pull his finger out. WEST YORKSHIRE Combined Authority – supposedly in charge of transport for Leeds City Region – is now recruiting a policy, strategy and communications director on a salary of up to £106,680 “to develop and deliver economic and transport policy”.

This is in addition to the two new communications and marketing officers being sought (each paid up to £34,344). Perhaps they’ll be supervised by the Evaluation and Economic Appraisal Manager (salary up to £51,507) or the Transport Analysis Team Leader (salary up to £39,219) also advertised this week.

How about combining all this money and getting a national transport big-hitter who can actually make a difference and get this region’s transport policy back on track sooner rather than later?

I’ve said it before and I will say it again. Yorkshire doesn’t need more bureaucrats.

It needs better bureaucrats. There’s a difference.

MY LOCAL MP Stuart Andrew appears particularly assiduous when it comes to his duties as a junior Welsh Minister. Never missing an opportunity to sit on the Commons frontbench, he was present – and joking with colleagues – during Monday’s debate on the Scottish Parliament’s powers when it comes to Brexit.

If only he was so attentive when it came to Yorkshire devolution – or sorting out rail services in his Pudsey constituency as commuters pay the price for disruption on Northern’s services. Or is he, too, waiting to be told how to vote?