sarries and gtr have had years to prepare for these timetable changes —— arriva and gtr.ld the companies to account. can he confirm that it companies to account. can he confirm thatitis companies to account. can he confirm that it is within the franchise agreement for arriva to report directly to him as the progress in recruiting and training drivers? doesn't the buck, once again, stop with him? gtr even had its own readiness board to implement the timetable changes, except it wasn't ready. mr speaker, you couldn't make this up. chris gibbs' report on southern a year ago highlighted the issue of driver numbers as a major operational issue within rail. why did the secretary of state not take the report as an alert to review the availability of train drivers which we re availability of train drivers which were needed across the country and do something about it? he says the o r i will report on the failings by the end of the year, but with the new timetable due in december, this will be too late. what confidence can we have that it won't be another shambles? isn't the reali

our staff, members within gtr, said clearly that there were going to be problems.ary. ultimately, he was the person that has overseen this vast and unwieldy franchise that has been failing from the start. he is the person that has encouraged such a big and long industrial dispute with one of the other unions that has plagued passenger lives. at the same time, it has really given carte blanche for too long for gtr to plough the same furrow. this latest episode, for anybody that works in the rail industry themselves, they were not surprised, just disappointed that it had not been picked up before. there is absolutely no reason that it should have happened. isn't it also down to things like the mechanics, the management contract? they were under contract and basically the company was told what to do, they said get on and manage it. it didn't really have an enormous control over what they were doing. they weren't allowed to? well, absolutely. management contracts in this particular instance are very badly designed, a badly designed way of running such a vast chunk of t

and so therefore what i think is incumbent upon gtr and network rail to do its very best to get notjustium long time but over the emergency timetable, to do better and work better and work harder at making sure they get a grip on that. and at the end of the debate, mps rejected by 305 votes to 285 the proposal of no confidence in mr grayling. now the prime minister has said that tax rises may be needed to pay for a boost in england's nhs funding. theresa may conceded the public would pay more, but promised this would be done in a "fair and balanced" way. the government has said economic growth and a "brexit dividend" will help cover the costs of increasing the budget by 20 billion pounds by 2023. but that was challenged by a labour mp, who raised the response to the announcement of the institute for fiscal studies. the ifs says there is no such thing as a brexit dividend. so the secretary of state will need to put up taxes to fund our nhs. will he be transparent and promise nhs workers in portsmouth who he has onlyjust given a pay rise to, that the burden will not fall on hard—working f

would the prime minister and my constituents that going forth, government will do everything it can to gtr and network rail to ensure a e better quality and higher now ty train service for and into the future? > can i say to my honorable friend, immediate priority is to ensure that we're seeing an services, and that is why they have introduced a new timetable which is not would be the final timetable but is better than the re-made timetable, but what we also need to do is to ensure that they take the actions so hey can bring forward that proposed new timetable which will provide more services and for passengers. but in the long term, what the government is work to do is to train and track together, problems don't see like this in the future. >> the prime minister will be aware that schools often zones.d in war ago, i met months seven students with my onstituency who asked me to sign the state school's declaration, which subsequently was signed. my question to the prime does that day is declaration mean that she'll now veto future arms sales to brutal regimes like saudi arabia, which has be

reassure me and my constituents that going forward the government will do everything it can to ensure that gtr and network rails get into shape to ensure a bte quality and higher quaty train service both now and into the future? >> can i say to my honorable friend, that as i said in response to the earlier questions from my honorable friend, the immediate priority is to ensure that we're seeing an improvement in svices for the passengers and that is why they have introduced a new timetable which is not the -- what would be the final timetae, but it is better than the premade timetable. ey will take the actions so so they can move forward the timetable which will provide better services for passengers. in the long-term what the government is working to do is bring train and track together so we don't see problems like this in the future. >> chris williamson? >> the prime minister will be aware that schools are often targeted in war zones. a couple of months ago i met students in my constituency to implored me to ask the prime minister to sign the safe school declaration. so my question to the p

out of ten trains are linked to the new timetable, so it's not bad everywhere, but we except in the gtr have been. you're taking the flak for them, we appreciate your time, but if you speak to northern tell them we will do it over skype, the phone, three 01’ do it over skype, the phone, three orfour minutes, do it over skype, the phone, three or four minutes, whatever‘s easiest, to a nswer or four minutes, whatever‘s easiest, to answer the viewer questions, that would be great. we live in hope. matt's here with a look at this morning's weather. good morning, a mixed leaves today, things getting better, more in the way of dry weather but this is a fairly familiar scene, grey skies overhead, that was in saltash in cornwall, and lots of cloud pushing in from the east which has already produced rain across parts of lincolnshire, yorkshire, parts of east anglia and east midlands and a few heavy showers running from northwest midlands through the merseyside and the far west of lincolnshire through the morning but elsewhere, lots of sunshine through the day across southern counties of england

network rail, northern come gtr come all of the companies involved in the areas where there have beenssengers. now it is up to the industry to make things right and give that certainty to those customers, hence the interim timetables come into effect which will see a number of services reduced but overall there will still be more trains running than they're worth before the recent timetable change. —— abound there were. the new prime minister of spain, pedro sanchez, will officially be sworn into office today, less than 24 hours after forcing out his predecessor, mariano rajoy. the head of the socialist party won the backing of several other parties to win his motion of no confidence after mr rajoy‘s conservative party became implicated in a corruption scandal. five people have died in a major food poisoning outbreak in the united states. almost 200 cases of e.coli linked to romaine lettuce have been reported across 35 states. it is the largest us outbreak of its kind in more than a decade. those are the main stories this morning. let's find out what is happening in the world of sport

gtr is going to be concentrating on trying to improve the system, deliver more certainty over the next timetables to bed done. we are just asking for people to bear with us. the endgame is to deliver better service. this is part of a long—term plan with the public and private sectors working together to improve and change the railways. that includes thousands of extra services every working week but in order to do that, to get more services on the tracks, we need to change the timetables to improve and increase the capacity. how long do people have to be patient for? i've heard you say the endgame is to express a better service. patients was really running thin. you said the blame is notjust on northern shoulders, it is also network rail, a complex picture, network rail, a complex picture, network rail, a complex picture, network rail is not going to go anywhere. how long does northern have to maintain any confidence that it should interview with the frontside? the interim timetable will run until the end ofjuly and then the full implementation of the timetable after that. clearly they

reassuringly and my constituents that going forward the government will do everything it can to ensure that gtrovement in services for the passengers on ago via thameslink and that is why they have introduced a new timetable which is not what will be the final timetable but is better than the premade timetable but what we also need to do is ensure that they take action so they can bring forward a proposed new timetable, which will provide more services and better services for passengers. but in the long term, what the government is wanting to do is bring train and track together so we can not see problems like this in the future. chris law, not here. all these opposition opportunities are being lost. i think that should not continue. the pre—minister will be aware that schools are often targeted in war zones schools are often targeted in war zones and a couple of months ago i made your seven students from these broken my constituency who implored me to ask the pre—minister to is a school ‘s declaration which i understand has subsequently been signed, so my question to the premise that today is

gtr, which runs thameslink, southern and great northern, cancelled hundred of services after the botchedng sales. bad weather didn't seem to dampen sales which rose over 2%, and the fact that it has bought booker, the food wholesaler boosted sales in the whole group. us telecoms giant at&t has completed its takeover of time warner. the deal, worth more than £60 billion, has been two years in the making, and was bedevilled by legal arguments over whether it was good — or bad — for competiton. but on tuesday a us judge ruled the deal didn't violate anti—competition laws and the deal was closed today. about 60 bank branches are closing every month — that's according to consumer group which? it claims that rbs is closing the most, and says it leaves many people left without proper access to services. in reply the banks say they are closing branches because more and more customers are banking online and keeping branches open which so few people use doesn't make economic sense. joining me now is gareth shaw, a money expert at the consumer group which?... the problem is, tanking is not a public

change, and so there was a knock on problem hundreds of people working urgently now, all i can say, in gtrtuation, that will m ea n twea ks ameliorate the situation, that will mean tweaks and changes but what they do not want to do is rush out something to try to make it better which only makes matters worse, there want to make sure they tested it, then they have to go to network rail to get approval of it before it can be lamented, but clearly, northern rail know that this is a matter of some urgency, and they are doing everything they can to put the situation and the plan in place that will help those passengers. you have been retraining drivers, why was that necessary? it is not the question of retraining, it is getting drivers to know what their new routes are, although rita change, they may be used to running the 8:54am service from a today, but instead now they are missing out some and putting in others. —— it is that routes have changed. —— from a to b. this is part of the long—term plan to improve railways, since 1994, demand has doubled, we are a railway that is running at capacit

i had many discussions with gtr in the run—up to the new timetable and they said they were ready.ew timetable, but not seeing the risks ahead. it wouldn't have been impossible just postponed or scale down the implementation of the timetable and avoid these problems. we needed an early warning system from the rail industry and we didn't get it. we do have to have this kind of enquiry to make sure this kind of catastrophe doesn't happen again in the future. thank you for your time this morning. and keep in touch with us about what is going on and how it is affecting you, as you have over the last few weeks or so. not wearing a hard hat in relation to this particular announcement, thatis to this particular announcement, that is related to sewage, amongst other things. i think they were hard hats needed in the financial crisis, which is where the story started. in the midst of a real financial crisis in the uk and across the world, rbs was bailed out to the tune of £45 billion. that gave the government of about 80% in the business, so they became the majority shareholders. since then