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Lockerbie Rail Services

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention. I know that he campaigns hard on behalf of his constituents. I say, as I said to the hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale, that this is about managing the timetable to get the best possible fit for connections and for the delivery of fast services, which is one of the things that is highlighted by the travelling public in virtually every survey and consultation that we undertake on reliability, punctuality and the speeds between fixed points. We believe that the new timetable will settle down fairly quickly. It was developed based on extensive consultation with many of the key stakeholders in the areas that the hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale and my hon. Friend the Member for Dumfries and Galloway (Mr. Brown) represent, and many others. Journey times will be considerably quicker, with the fastest journey time taking three hours and 24 minutes, compared with well over four hours at the moment. That represents a fall of more than 40 minutes. I am aware that there is local disappointment about the services on offer, but the hon. Member for Dumfriesshire, Clydesdale and Tweeddale referred to the services to Manchester and Manchester airport as being a success and well en route to meeting some of the requirements of his good constituents in Lockerbie. There has been a genuine consultation and discussion about how best to utilise the vast investment that has gone into the west coast main line in order to meet the requirements of high-speed services and the requirements of a significant number of communities that are on that line. As the hon. Gentleman rightly said, a number of those trains still go through Lockerbie, but they are fast services and have been able to reduce some of the journey times by more than 40 minutes only because they are not stopping. It has been necessary to balance those requirements. In conclusion, I recognise the need to balance the demands of reliability, punctuality and speed. The hon. Gentleman’s comments will have been taken on board. We will watch the implementation of the new timetable closely. I believe that it will settle down, but there are always options open for discussion at other times. The motion having been made after Ten o’clock, and the debate having continued for half an hour, Mr. Deputy Speaker adjourned the House without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.