1/4 Quite a bit of reporting today about what Grant Shapps said yesterday @CommonsTrans about the future of the #railway.

A reminder that unless there is primary legislation, any reform to #franchising will still be within the legal constraints of the Railways Act 1993

2/4 So what we *might* see in the short term is a series of exemption orders (like those #TfL and #Merseyrail have) allowing franchises to move to concessions, where the body letting the contract holds more control and takes the financial risk.

3/4 Part of the Williams plan may have been to try something different on long distance routes (open access timetable slot auctions?), but clearly while there is very little income that is not going to work.

4/4 There is also the hanging question of #devolution - who will be the contract/concession holder?

Perhaps a mix of DfT for long distance routes and metro mayors for e.g. the #North and the #Midlands?

Will be fascinating to see how quickly SofS moves on all this...