Lichfield MP demands action on London Midland rail cancellations
The Government will be urged to strip a rail company of its franchise if it does not show sufficient improvement following months of cancellations.
London Midland scrapped about 1,000 services between October and December because of staffing shortages.
Lichfield MP Michael Fabricant is prepared to call on the Department for Transport to strip it of its licence if things have not improved by the end of this month. London Midland said things were largely back to normal by December 9.
That was when new timetables were introduced and the firm reorganised its shifts. But a staff sickness bug led to delays over the Christmas holidays.
London Midland is handing out five days worth of free tickets to season ticket holders who were affected by the earlier staffing shortages after 30 drivers left within a short space of time.
Mr Fabricant said: "London Midland gave an undertaking that their service would be restored in January. If it is not, then I will be pressing the Department for Transport to revoke their licence."
On its website, London Midland said: "Although we worked hard to ensure the shortage was addressed and resolved as quickly as possible, we recognise that recent disruption has been unacceptable to passengers. It is also not what we expect of ourselves and we are sorry for letting you down.
"From the onset of this issue we ensured that the Department for Transport was kept up-to-date with our operational performance and have since been working closely with them to create a passenger-focused plan which will offer real customer benefits. This is in addition to improved processes, planning and partnerships which will help deliver better punctuality across our network."
