The UK government has achieved “very little” in their railway reforms six years after first identifying the need for such a reform, a recent report found. Members of Parliament on the cross-party public accounts committee - the parliament’s spending watchdog - have said the Department of Transport has neglected the needs of its passengers and taxpayers.
The committee also claimed that they haven’t seen evidence that plans for Great British Railways (GBR) - a proposed public body which would oversee services and infrastructure - would include any new reform ideas that would differ to those of the past two decades.
GBR was scheduled to launch in March of this year, but the launch has been delayed as the government has yet to designate specific responsibilities of the body and how those differ from the government as well as from commercial operations. Delaying the launch of GBR has also delayed potential savings of up to £1.5bn a year, said one source.
The MPs wrote in a report that was published on Monday, that “many of the proposed reforms and associated benefits are largely on hold until the next parliament when legislation can be passed”. UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has called for a general election for July 4, so in the meantime the UK government is rushing to finish their work and push through any final legislation.
“It has been six years since the department identified the need for a root and branch review of the railway, but it has achieved very little in this time,” the committee said.
“While the department is fully aware of what is important to passengers, it has not delivered on the basic things that matter most,” the report said. “Although the department [for transport] claims that improving passenger experiences is at the heart of its reform plans, poor performance persists across the rail network," the report said, adding that during the 2022-23 operating year 13.7% of trains were delayed and 3.8% were canceled.
Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced his railway reform plans in 2021 which included the proposed GBR tasked with overseeing the project. But the committee says a lot of work remains to be done for those plans to be realized.
In 2018, Northern Trains introduced new timetables which led to widespread disruption. A review led by the former rail minister found “cancellations, delays, overcrowding and late-running caused significant disruption to the lives of passengers, and trust in the railways' ability to provide reliable services was severely affected." The report added that passengers had “lost their trust in the system”.