Red Wall rail revamp under threat from lack of drivers

PLANS to improve poorly performing rail services across Red Wall seats are under threat from a lack of drivers.

Northern rail, nationalised in 2020, following a long period of customer dissatisfaction, is planning to increase services to 95 per cent of pre-pandemic levels when timetables change on Dec 11, The Sunday Telegraph has learnt.

Aslef, the trade union, has warned rail chiefs that there are not enough train drivers to deliver an increase in service levels. Northern is believed to be at about 80 per cent of pre-pandemic capacity. There are fears of chaotic scenes if it goes ahead with the timetable changes with the operator forced into last-minute cancellations.

Four and a half years ago the train industry was plunged into turmoil after sweeping changes to rail services across the country backfired.

Passengers suffered hundreds of daily cancellations as operators claimed warnings that they were not ready for the changes fell on deaf ears.

Industry sources fear a repeat could be on the cards in December. “This could be May 2018 all over again,” said one source. Bosses at Northern are desperate to increase train service levels.

Operators have been widely criticised over the performance of trains across the North of England.

Northern prompted fury by cutting services in May and others such as the TransPennine Express and Avanti have been criticised for poor service levels.

Labour mayors from West Yorkshire, South Yorkshire, Manchester, Liverpool and North of Tyne wrote to the Government in October, saying that rail services were in a state of emergency.

They said: “As thousands of last-minute cancellations continue to make life miserable for people in the North and cause serious damage to the economy, the Government remains in a state of paralysis, having just appointed its third transport secretary in seven weeks.

“If this level of disruption was being experienced in other parts of the country, we believe action would already have been taken to improve matters.

“We do not accept that passengers in the North should be treated in this way and are just expected to put up with it. We won’t.”

Tricia Williams, chief operating officer at Northern, said: “Northern’s new timetable comes into effect next month with some significant changes to service times and stopping points, as well as some additional [services].”

Details of the Dec 11 timetable changes for most train operators have yet to be published.

The West coast operator Avanti, the most criticised firm of late, intends to increase services to three trains an hour between London and Manchester.

Chiltern Railways said it would add 1,139 more seats every week day across its busiest lines.

Details will be published “when available” for Northern services, according to the National Rail website.