Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)

I thank my noble friend for that question. Indeed, I have discussed with him and others the rather too frequent regularity of cancellations north of Preston. I will not reiterate what I have just said about the effects of the storms last week. There have been other occasions when the railway infrastructure has not been up to withstanding the weather and storms. However, I agree with my noble friend, as I agreed with the noble Lord, Lord Goddard, that one expectation of those who run railway services for the department is that there should be sufficient resilience in what they do to cater for the exigencies of normal operation. It is this that I will be discussing in some detail with Avanti and Network Rail on Friday. In respect of the future renewal and upgrade of the west coat main line north of Preston, the news that was in the papers in the past few days is premature because it was Network Rail’s proposition to renew the overhead wires between Preston and the Scottish border. The arrangements are not yet agreed, and the release of that information to the public—I think by one of the train operators—was premature. That was industry’s consultation, and there will be more to be said about it at a future date.