Simon Lightwood

My hon. Friend makes an important point. We must ensure that passengers are at the core of what we deliver, but the knock-on effect on businesses is also important. GBR will also focus on freight: how do we get some of the cargo transported by our roads on to our trains? My hon. Friend the Member for Hitchin (Alistair Strathern) talked about the need for more train crew. GTR is particularly vulnerable to the effect of train crew availability issues—the problem tends to be the availability, rather than the number, of train crew—and of all Thameslink’s cancellations, 50% are attributed to train crew. That is largely due to historical terms and conditions and legacy agreements that mean that there is a high level of reliance on rest-day working. I will close by confirming that this Government will continue to put passengers at the heart of what we do and deliver a railway of which, in its 200th year, we can be proud once again. I thank the hon. Member for Mid Bedfordshire again and acknowledge the importance of this matter to him and his constituents. Question put and agreed to.