Last week the Government finally faced up to something most Northern commuters could have told them months if not years ago – that TransPennine Express services are less reliable than a chocolate teapot. I welcome the news that their services will no longer be required once their contract is complete.

The curtailment of their reign of ineptitude is essential but I have to ask why on earth has it taken the Government so long? Some months we’ve had less than half the timetabled services running. Every single week I contacted by constituents in a state of despair, once again finding their journey to work or study cancelled, delayed or otherwise disrupted.

One constituent reasonably asked why the dreaded rail replacement bus service from Stalybridge to Manchester was on a busy weekend inexplicably a minibus with seats for fewer than twenty people when at least sixty individuals were waiting for it. Not so much a rail replacement as a transport lottery. People simply cannot plan their lives around service levels this unreliable.

The impact of this dire level of service is missed economic opportunities, a backwards step on the Government’s so called “levelling up agenda”. More meetings are scheduled virtually from home meaning less incidental expenditure in retail and hospitality. More conferences are scheduled in the South where organisers have less travel disruption to fear burdening delegates with. Fewer people opt to rely on train travel to see friends and relatives elsewhere in the North, meaning even less footfall in struggling town centres. Those who are in a position to opt to drive journeys because the rail provision simply cannot be relied upon.

I know there are extremely hardworking people working on our railways including for TransPennine Express, and I respect that it is an industry which has seen long-term underinvestment and in which the unexpected can be relied upon to happen. But if we want the railways to remain and grow for years to come, rail bosses simply have to design services which are more resilient to multiple eventualities, and crucially cannot let the customer base fall away through lack of custom.

It is increasingly clear that Labour’s policy of returning the rail network to public control as the franchises expire is the way forward. I feel it is becoming more and more apparent that directly operated railways can bring about improvements. The TPE chocolate teapot has, regrettably, melted all over the Government’s hands. We simply can’t deliver economic transformation to the North if people cannot get from A to B within it.