Dutch giant Abellio to invest £1bn in UK train network in lifeline to Bombardier

Euston
The West Midlands franchise, for which Abellio has placed the order for trains, runs out of London's Euston station

Theresa May will receive a much-needed Brexit boost today as plans are unveiled for a £1bn investment in the West Midlands train network.

Dutch transport giant Abellio has placed a bumper order for more than 100 trains as part of a hi-tech upgrade of the franchise, which covers routes in the West Midlands, as well as from London Euston to Crewe, and Liverpool to Birmingham.

Bombardier UK has won a big chunk of the contract to make the new, longer trains, at its factory in Derby, in a big boost for local employment and the region’s transport services. In total, 330 electric carriages will be assembled at the plant.

It will be hailed as a major vote of confidence in post-Brexit Britain just days after EU leaders declared that negotiations were deadlocked. Mrs May arrived with a Cabinet delegation in Brussels yesterday for further talks, amid reports she had pleaded with Angela Merkel to help break the impasse.

Abellio’s order is a lifeline for Bombardier’s UK operations, which are reeling from a potentially ruinous trade war between its Canadian parent and Boeing. The spat has thrown the future of 5,000 jobs in Belfast, where Bombardier makes plane wings, into doubt.

It comes two months after a consortium of Abellio and Japan’s East Japan Railway Company and Mitsui won a 10-year contract to run the line. A further 100 diesel cars will be built by Spanish train and tram builder Grupo CAF.

A total of £680m will be spent to increase capacity and improve journey times on the franchise, which became renowned for record delays to services under previous operator London Midland. Abellio, which also operates the ScotRail, Greater Anglia and Merseyrail lines, said the overhaul will provide space for an extra 85,000 passengers on rush hour services into Birmingham and London by 2020.

It has also promised journeys will be faster and more comfortable, with air conditioning, free Wi-Fi and in-seat power sockets provided as standard. By the end of the franchise there will be 25pc more train carriages available.

A further £300m has been pledged for new depots, and on modernising stations along the line with 1,000 new car parking spaces and over 2,500 cycle parking spaces. Waiting rooms will be refurbished, more seats installed at stations, and feasibility studies undertaken into the prospect of creating new stations in the West Midlands.

The contract will also lead to 900 new apprenticeships over the course of the franchise, which runs from December until March 2026.

Govia, a joint venture between GoAhead and France’s Keolis, failed to hold on to the line it had run for a decade after widespread criticism over delays and cancellations.

Bombardier’s 175-year-old train-building works in Derby was threatened with closure in 2011 when the company lost out to German rival Siemens on a £1.6bn contract to make Thameslink trains. Some 1,500 jobs were lost as a result.

However, the group has since won several major deals including a £1bn East Anglia trains deal in 2016 and a £900m order for the South Western franchise.

Chris Grayling, the Transport Secretary, said: “We are delivering the biggest rail modernisation programme for over a century.”

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