Summary
This Report from the Committee of Public Accounts, 'Reducing Passenger Rail Delays by Better Management of Incidents' (HC 655), examines how the rail industry, led by the Department for Transport (the Department) and Network Rail, manages incidents on the rail network and how passengers are treated when delays occur.
The Report follows on from a March 2008 National Audit Office report on the same topic ('Reducing Passenger Rail Delays by Better Management of Incidents' (HC 308).
The Committee has set out a number of conclusions and recommendations, including:
- Network Rail receives only half of its funding from the taxpayer but as a private sector company it is not directly accountable to Parliament. The Committee states the Department should strengthen the governance and accountability arrangements.
- The Office of Rail Regulation should review and revise targets where appropriate to take account of changing conditions and challenges.
- The Department needs to play a more active role in bringing together the rail industry, emergency services and other stakeholders to improve incident management.
- The Office of Rail Regulation should make sure mechanisms are in place so that the emergency services know who to contact during rail incidents.
- Passengers are not receiving the information they need during delays and are not always told how to claim compensation for delays.
During the 2006-07 period, over 1.2 billion passenger journeys were made in Great Britain on services that arrived on time almost nine times out of ten. The Department provided £3.4 billion to Network Rail and £1.7 billion to the train operating companies, whilst passengers paid some £5.1 billion in fares. The National Audit Office estimates that delays cost passengers £1 billion in terms of lost time.
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