When will GWR sort out their crew issues??

[whole diary]

[grahame]

When will GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) sort out (or be allowed to sort out) their crew issues?  Two weeks of completed "running" of their new December 2022 to May 2023 timetable, but more trains have been cancelled than have run on time.  And on only 2 days of the 14 (21st and 22nd December) have they had enough staff available. 

Make no mistake that during Industrial Action, both Didcot and Westbury signal boxes have been open during the day and there's no network reason that trains could not run from Westbury to Swindon at normal times that the railway was open (07:36, 09:46, 12:17, 14:18, and 16:25) and back at 08:45, 11:05, 13:15, 15:14, and 17:36.

Code:

 Day	TT	On time	V.late 	Cancelled
	Trains	Trains	Trains	Trains	and why
 11	14	7	1	6	Train fault; Crew Shortage; Points Failure
 12	17	15	0	2	Late Crew
 13	17	0	0	17	Industrial Action
 14	17	0	0	17	Industrial Action
 15	17	3	1	13	Industrial Action, Train fault
 16	17	0	0	17	Indistrial Action
 17	17	0	0	17	Industrial Action
 18	14	4	0	10	Crew Shortage
 19	17	15	0	2	Crew Shortage
 20	17	14	0	3	Crew Shortage, Points Failure
 21	17	17	0	0	The only day in 2 weeks that they all ran!
 22	17	13	1	3	Supermarket Trolley on track
 23	17	15	0	2	Crew Shortage
 24	17	11	0	6	Industrial Action, Crew issue
 Totals	232	114	3	115

This is not the reliable service that GWR are contracted to provide (or is it? What does the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) require of GWR these days).  Happy for it to be simplified - 05:17, 07:17 and 09:17, 12:17, 14:17 and 16:47, 19:17 and 21:47 from Westbury, 06:11, 08:11, 10:11, 13:11, 15:11 and 17:41, 20:11 and 22:42 from Swindon.

Simple shuttle train.  Personal need break opportunities in there.  Decent connections via Salisbury to and from the Portsmouth service (but assuming that service does not dramatically change at Westbury.  Tweaking may be usefuk to help connections at Trowbridge and Chippenham to / from Bristol Temple Meads.  Enough trains from Swindon to London to not worry too much, and probably worth a look at a morning connection from Westbury to Weymouth and an evening one back.

[ChrisB]

With the ban on overtime and Rest Day working, I suspect that your line has been sacrificed to pull more crew onto other main line services.

[grahame]

With the ban on overtime and Rest Day working, I suspect that your line has been sacrificed to pull more crew onto other main line services.

You may be right. 

But you do not provide an answer to the question ... "When will GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) sort out (or be allowed to sort out) their crew issues?" ... which means providing staff to reliably run the contracted service.

[ChrisB]

DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) to answer that. I suspect it's tied up with the 'modernisation' requirements.

[GBM]

Possibly all part of the cost cutting measures unfortunately