Commenting on the Ministerial Statement issued by Lord Adonis (Secretary of State for Transport) issued today (10th December) and reproduced below, Michael Fabricant says:-

"The so called ‘remedial plan’ will be the key. Cheap ticket promotions are all very well, but what commuters want is reliability of service. They want to know that if they get on a London-Midland train, it will arrive on time and not end up stopping half way through the journey with passengers being told to leave the train because it won’t reach its final destination.

"I welcome the provision of better station signs particularly at Lichfield Trent Valley station where there is no visual indication on the platforms regarding the arrival and departure times of individual trains.

"But it will all be pretty pointless if the signs simply say: ‘TRAIN CANCELLED’ "

Michael Fabricant questioned ministers over the future of the London-Midland train contract back in September.
See:
www.michael.fabricant.mp.co.uk/news-00890.ihtml
and
www.michael.fabricant.mp.co.uk/news-00876.ihtml

The Secretary of State for the Department for Transport (Lord Adonis) has made the following Ministerial Statement (10.11.09):

The performance of London Midland on 6 September 2009 fell short of its customers’ expectations and was unacceptable to both passengers and Government.

I can now outline the measures I have taken, and the actions I have agreed with London Midland in respect of London Midland’s breach of its franchise agreement.

First, I have issued London Midland with a Remedial Plan Notice for exceeding the Franchise Agreement threshold on cancellations. This requires London Midland to submit to me a Remedial Plan for addressing the level of cancellations. Discussions are at an advanced stage on a range of measures to be implemented within the Remedial Plan.

The Remedial Plan will be contractualised as a Remedial Agreement.

Second, a package of additional benefits for passengers has been agreed, including: An additional franchise agreement obligation to invest in new, and additional, high-quality information equipment, spending no less than £4.4 million over the life of the franchise in addition to the investment that has already committed in the franchise agreement; and

A promotion for 50,000 day rover tickets for travel over the Christmas period and London Midland will also make available an additional 400,000 Advance Purchase tickets over the next two years on some of the most popular routes.