This week, the Government announced that GTR, the UK’s largest railway franchise, which operates Thameslink and Great Northern in the constituency, will transfer to public ownership on May 31 2026.
Richard Fuller MP said:
GTR have been failing my constituents for too long.
Being able to rely on a regular, basic train service should be the lowest rung of expectations. GTR have failed to meet that mark on the Biggleswade and Sandy line for many years.
That’s why I chose to bring issues to a head with my recent meeting with the COO. I said that neither I, nor my constituents, had any more time for their explanations and excuses. My impression was that this new executive recognised the failures and, though not all levers were at his disposal, that he would do his best to make improvements.
I get that GTR don’t control all levers for improvement. The Labour government can help, but does not seem interested. They handed out huge wage increases with no requirement for the unions to up their game.
Working practices that impede improvements are jealously protected by unions.
Time is running out on GTR - literally! The government has now announced that the service will be nationalised in May 2026.
Whilst many will welcome this news, I'm afraid I don't see this as a 'silver bullet' that will solve the problems. It could well be the same people running the service as now; the East Coast Line with the well documented bottleneck at Welwyn viaduct will still restrict the numbers of trains operating and a government racking up enormous debts will hardly be in a position to plough additional resources into the service and the trade unions will be even further emboldened. Meanwhile, GTR have absolutely no incentive to improve the situation over the coming months.
You can read more about Richard's work on improving services in Biggleswade and Sandy at https://www.richardfuller.co.uk/campaigns/gtr-train-services-biggleswade-and-sandy
