I have been contacted by a number of constituents regarding the temporary timetable on the Maryhill railway line (between Glasgow Queen Street and Anniesland). I had a meeting with ScotRail in August to raise the concerns I have regarding the latest temporary timetable.

Sunday Service

Of particular interest to me is a Sunday service. That is something particularly personal to me, as I previously led a successful campaign to introduce a Sunday service. Previous to this, the services ran only for the 6 weeks prior to Christmas.

The withdrawal of the current Sunday service is part of the new temporary timetable which has witnessed 45% of Sunday services being withdrawn across Scotland. For instance, Paisley Canal currently does not have its Sunday service either.

I have already had a cast iron guarantee (before last week’s meeting) that the Sunday service will return once the current dispute ends. Indeed, likewise there is a guarantee the wider service will also return Monday to Saturday.

Ongoing dispute

The ongoing pay dispute is at the heart of the current issues. There has now been three rounds of pay talks with ScotRail, and I was heartened to hear that unions have described these as constructive. That gives me optimism that the dispute will not be prolonged. I understand that should a potential agreement be reached, then it would likely take around a month to revert to the previous timetable.

ScotRail did offer some reassurances over how the network has performed since being taken into public ownership. I understand the amount of daily journeys has increased from around 190,000 to 230,000 in that time. Indeed, the new temporary timetable is today carrying a similar amount of journeys each day. The difference is that the new temporary timetable offer more reliability and less cancellations. I appreciate that is not a great comfort to users of the Maryhill line (myself included) given the temporary reduction in services we have witnessed.

The statistics for the Maryhill line shows that before the temporary timetable was published, there were around 1,400 daily journeys (Mon-Fri), 1,200 (Sat) and 600 (Sun). Under the temporary timetable that is now 1,000 / 1,100 / no Sunday service respectively.

Future plans

We also discussed how to incentivise the retention of ScotRail staff including drivers, and potential changes to the contracts of ScotRail staff. Other than engineers, all ScotRail staff are not required to routinely work rest days, complete overtime or Sundays. The current dispute is workers meeting their contractual obligations and exercising their employment rights. In doing so (before the temporary timetable was introduced) up to 300 trains were being cancelled at short notice each day. The temporary timetable was to offer greater certainty and stability.

However in 2022, ScotRail and trade unions entered into an agreement to work together to change the contractual position of railway staff to include working Sundays by 2027. That work is ongoing and has not been compromised by the current dispute.

It has been mentioned drivers elsewhere in the UK being paid more than train drivers with ScotRail. That has been a pattern for a long period of time and there is an acknowledgement within the workforce planning to include additional trainees to take account of driver retiral, drivers moving to other rail carriers and growing our railway (more services).

Each year ScotRail take on around 160 new recruits to train as drivers. Each year around 100 drivers leave ScotRail. The majority is retiral but some do leave to work elsewhere. That leaves around 60 additional (net) to grow the railway. That remains the commitment of ScotRail.

Public Ownership

I am proud we have taken Scotland's railway back into public ownership. Clearly, the railway is subsidised by Government and there will always be a relationship between the money made available to ScotRail by Government and the work ScotRail is able to carry out. That is why it remains vital to grow our railway in terms of footfall, service and revenue; as well as trying to make the journeys as affordable as possible. Indeed, that was the intention with the abolition of peak fares pilot.

Recent Cancelations

Unfortunately there have been further cancellations this week (w/c 19 August 2024) affecting the Maryhill line. I have written to ScotRail regarding these cancellations. I will post the reply when I receive this. In the meantime, here is a copy of the letter I have sent:

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