‘Little’ impact from GWEP wiring cutback, says the DfT
When the National Audit Office (NAO) publishes a report, the Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee (PAC) follows up with an inquiry.
On 3 March the PAC published the report on its ‘Modernising the Great Western Railway’ inquiry, which complemented last November’s NAO report on the Great Western Route Modernisation.
Since the NAO report covered much the same ground as my feature articles on the Great Western Electrification Programme (GWEP) a few months earlier in the year I decided to spare readers a table-laden action replay. And anyway, there were more important issues to cover, not least the decision to defer sections of GWEP (‘Informed Sources’, December 2016).
So why does the PAC follow-up now merit space? Because, in its evidence to the PAC, the Department for Transport has driven another nail into electrification’s coffin.
EXCULPATION
In an effort to excuse its incompetence, DfT told the PAC with blithe insouciance that its decision to defer around 15% of GWEP’s electrified track mileage will have ‘little, if any, impact on the benefits of this programme to passengers’.
Many of the benefits, such as more trains per hour, journey time savings …
