Met senior GTR officials today including Passenger Services Director Stuart Cheshire and Deputy CEO Alex Foulds. I explained the seriousness of the situation and pressed on all issues. Their overall assessment is still for a more reliable and robust timetable in mid-July.

I pushed particular concerns from this week about:

• The dreadful performance on Monday
• Services to and from Cambridge and North Herts stations, including bad overcrowding, particularly the effect on school and college students
• Slow evening trains to Baldock
• Absence of weekend services
• How the compensation scheme will work for regular travellers with carnets

I am contacting Ministers about the compensation point, because they are key to the detail of the scheme. Stuart Cheshire has worked to improve the morning school/college service into Cambridge and asked for more detail on the afternoon/evening concerns, which I am giving to him.

They acknowledged that the weekend/Monday service was poor and are taking steps to try to improve this aspect.

I ended up pointing to the frustration and dislocation to people’s lives caused by this mess.