Grayling urged to meet staff who have faced wrath of passengers

DISABLED PASSENGERS will not be able to get on certain trains passing through Yorkshire because they are made up of old rolling stock, it has emerged.

TransPennine Express has revealed that it will use older Mark 3 carriages on some services between Liverpool and Scarborough, stopping at Manchester Victoria, Huddersfield and Leeds, starting later this year.

The operator says the two temporary trains will make up 2.9 per cent of the total 2,067 services it runs each week and will only run until the end of the year.

A spokeswoman confirmed that these carriages, unlike its modern, refurbished Class 185 trains, do not have disabled access, but said that as trains ran every 15 minutes on that route disabled passengers would not have to wait long to get on a train.

In the Commons this week, Colne Valley MP Thelma Walker said: “Disabled passengers in my constituency have been told they won’t be able to catch certain trains, as Trans-Pennine are using old rolling stock to try and fix the broken timetables and reduce delays.” UNDER-FIRE TRANSPORT Secretary Chris Grayling has been challenged to meet rail staff suffering abuse from passengers because of the travel chaos.

The Rail, Maritime and Transport union has warned that its members have been verbally abused since new timetables were introduced last month, leading to delays and cancellations across South-East England and the North.

Labour has called on Mr Grayling to resign.

RMT general secretary Mick Cash said: “The total chaos unleashed by Chris Grayling on our railways has left staff at the sharp end abandoned to their fate by his private train operators.”

The warning came on the day it was announced members of the RMT on Arriva Rail North (Northern) will walk out for 24 hours on June 19, 21 and 23 as part of the long-running dispute over the role of guards. Mr Cash added: “We have seen over the past fortnight that Northern is a company which has declared war on its passengers and staff alike.

“RMT will not stand aside while the threat to axe safetycritical guards from Northern services remains central to the company plans.

“This company has reduced the timetable to total chaos and the union will not allow them to slash the safety culture to ribbons in the same fashion.

“It is a tribute to the determination and professionalism of RMT members on Arriva Rail North that they have remained rock solid for over a year now in what is a clear-cut battle to put public safety before private profit.

“German-owned Northern Rail want to run half a million trains a year without a safety-critical guard on board in a move that would wreck both safety and access to services and they should listen to their front-line staff and pull back from that plan immediately. RMT has agreed arrangements in Wales and Scotland that enshrine the guard guarantee.

“If it’s good enough for Wales and Scotland to have safe rail services it should be good enough for the rest of Britain.”