Industrial Action on the Railways — House of Lords, 2022-06-20
Topic: Transportation
Charlotte Vere (Conservative, Centre-right): I am trying to answer the questions that the noble Baroness asked. As I was about to go on to say, it is clear that the industry will do whatever it can to avoid job losses. There will be voluntary schemes, and we expect them to be popular. But of course each train operating company, and indeed Network Rail, has a vision for how we will put the reforms into practice, and there will be different ways that each organisation will do that, with the human resources available to it. We will have to see how that all pans out because, obviously, different organisations will require a different number of people to carry our different levels of service I turn to some of the other questions that the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, raised. She mentioned that there is no mandate. There is a mandate for both Network Rail and the train operating companies. However, even so—I will say this again and again and no doubt I will be at the Dispatch Box many times talking about it—this is not just about pay; this is about terms and conditions, and we have known about changes to those for a very long time. We need to think about how we get to a stage where we manage to operate a seven-day railway in circumstances where, at the moment, you simply cannot. Southeastern’s high-speed operation, which has been in place since 2009, is incredibly successful. It is a great service, and that is the level of customer offer that we really should be giving to our customers on a modern railway, particularly as leisure travel is so important The noble Baroness also mentioned safety. Safety is, of course, the Government’s top priority. We have one of the safest railways in Europe, and there is an enormous uptick in the amount of advanced technology used for safety on railways—such as drones to check rail lines, which is much more effective than doing that by eye, and all sorts of machines that check for internal cracks in the rails. So, yes, there is an increased use of technology, and sometimes that means that people’s roles will necessarily have to change. The noble Baroness said that this will deeply affect the workers, and I agree. I feel very sorry for that, because at the end of the day we need those workers, and we want them to create these railways of the future. We do not want them to go on strike; we do not want them to damage their own livelihoods, which is what striking will do The noble Baroness, Lady Smith, and the noble Lord, Lord Fox, said that the Government are apparently not lifting a finger. I can absolutely reassure them both that the Government have been working on this all through the weekend. Obviously, at the moment, this is the biggest priority for my department. It is taking up an enormous amount of time in the department—rightly so—because you cannot build a modern railway on poor foundations. That is what we run the risk of doing. We must make sure that we have reforms, particularly to working practices, such that we can create the modern railway that we all want. At the moment, we are not there The noble Lord, Lord Fox, asked about agency workers, and we are looking at all options for them, because we do not want future strikes to punish the travelling public. When I have more information, I will of course bring it back to your Lordships’ House. In the meantime, I believe I have answered all the questions.