My Lords, from listening to the noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, I think there is a misunderstanding about what the Government are trying to do. As I understand it as a humble Back-Bencher, we are trying to get rid of the franchising system because, as it is, it does not help us to run a railway in the way we want to. In his opening remarks the noble Lord, Lord Hendy, said that one of the points is to have a simplified fare system that will greatly raise the prospects of increasing passenger revenue and passenger use of the railway, because the fare system is an obstacle to that. We cannot do that while we have the franchise system, so we have to get rid of the franchise system.
If there is any fault in what is happening at the moment, it lies on the opposite side of the Chamber and with the Transport Ministers who gave operators such as Avanti the very loose targets that they have to meet. I advocate that we should be tougher with Avanti, have it in every month, and if things have not improved, we should take the risk of taking the franchise off it and saying, “See you in court”. That would be my approach, but the problem is what the Conservatives have left us with, and that is very difficult to solve. I do not support this amendment, which would result just in extending the existing system.