Here in the Brentwood and Ongar constituency, we are fortunate to have four railway stations which act as gateways to London, the Essex coast, and North Essex up to Suffolk. It’s certainly not impossible to have an entirely train travel based holiday without the need to get the car out and suffer the travel congestion of popular UK holiday destinations.
My ongoing campaigns for lifts at Brentwood Station and West Horndon Station continue, and I was pleased to be able to meet up recently with met the Managing Director of Trenitalia C2C, Ben Ackroyd. to discuss rail services. Trenitalia has just signed a new two-year National Rail Contract with the Department for Transport, and Ben assured me there are plans in place to develop the station, including better disabled access. Much of this depends on local development, including Dunton Garden Village, which will see West Horndon Station becoming a multi-modal transport hub for trains and buses.
Nationally, the Transport Secretary, Grant Shapps, is working on the Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail White Paper. In 2018, following a chaotic timetable change, the Government commissioned Keith Williams to undertake a root and branch review of how our railway system operates. What it found was a railway system which was too fragmented, too complicated and which did not put passengers first.
The Williams-Shapps Plan for Rail sets out the reforms we will make a bold new vision for passengers – of punctual and reliable services, simpler tickets and a modern, green and innovative railway that meets the needs of the nation.
A new body, Great British Railways, is being created to integrate the railways for the first time in a quarter of a century, owning the infrastructure, collecting most fare revenue, running and planning the network and setting timetables. It will be a single, familiar brand responsible for delivering better value fares, punctual and reliable services and which ends the confusion of the current system.
Great British Railways will also simplify the current mass of confusing tickets. This will include rolling out new flexible season tickets, making significant roll-outs of pay as you go, contactless ticketing and digital ticketing on smartphones.
This is an exciting time for the rail industry and I look forward to be benefits it will bring to my constituents.
