On the subject of timekeeping of freight services, I've noticed from RTT that the best timekeeping of all the trains through Cheltenham - both passenger and freight -  appears to be the 'Tesco' trains that run between their distribution centres.  I guess that the SLA (Service Level Agreement) for these trains is particularly tight, and tighter than, for example, mineral trains.

.....In the middle of the night perhaps it doesn't matter so much.....

08:46 Swindon to Weymouth due 11:08

08:46 Swindon to Weymouth due 11:08 will be terminated at Westbury.
It will no longer call at Frome, Bruton, Castle Cary, Yeovil Pen Mill, Maiden Newton, Dorchester West and Weymouth.
This is due to a shortage of train crew.

OK, I'll bite. The APT was failed by a country that was in fundamentally unserious mode concerning the train and I suspect that many other aspects of railway travel benefitted from the research that produced it. Also, to engineer that tilt mechanism in a purely analogue way. If the trains running on the GWML now were a descendent of the ATP I suspect that everyone would be rather happier with the ambience of the passenger compartments than they are.

Mark

One benefit of being laid up with a heavy cold and being kept awake with frequent coughing fits! 

16:23 Westbury to Swindon due 17:06

16:23 Westbury to Swindon due 17:06 will be cancelled.

This is due to a shortage of train crew.

17:35 Swindon to Westbury due 18:18

17:35 Swindon to Westbury due 18:18 will be cancelled.

This is due to a shortage of train crew.

18:35 Westbury to Swindon due 19:17

18:35 Westbury to Swindon due 19:17 will be cancelled.

This is due to a shortage of train crew.

19:38 Weymouth to Swindon due 22:00

19:38 Weymouth to Swindon due 22:00 will be started from Westbury.

It will no longer call at Weymouth, Dorchester West, Maiden Newton, Chetnole, Yetminster, Thornford, Yeovil Pen Mill, Castle Cary and Frome.

This is due to a shortage of train crew.

Stock up on food to prepare for extreme weather, minister says

Households should stock up on food to prepare for extreme weather as the strongest El Niño event in a generation develops over the Pacific Ocean, a government minister has said.

Environment Secretary Dame Angela Eagle told the Guardian the powerful natural climate phenomenon will lead to "more extreme storms in this country".  Her comments came as the National Audit Office (NAO) warned Britain's food supply chain is at risk given the growing threat of cyber-attacks and the climate crisis.

The NAO said the government was too reliant on the private sector to deal with food supply disruption. The government is due to unveil a strategy about preparing for national emergencies later this year.

Dame Angela said "We're about to experience probably the largest El Niño that has ever been seen, and that will lead to drier summers, wetter winters, with more extreme storms in this country.

"It will do a lot more damage in Asia with flooding, and therefore I think that we need to take it seriously.  If you've got a store of a bit of food that can keep you going for a while before the emergency services can get to you, you're going to be a lot better off than if you haven't.  So some of it is that kind of preparation for just being a bit more resilient."

Her comments came as an NAO report warned Britain's food supply chain is vulnerable to plant or human disease outbreaks, cyber-attacks and extreme weather.  It also cited climate change as a longer-term chronic risk which could leave Britain's food supply at risk.  The disruptions could push up prices and leave vulnerable people struggling to buy food, it said.

The NAO said the Department for Food, the Environment and Rural Affairs (Defra) was too reliant on private companies to handle disruptions to food supply.  It added the department had not done enough in recent years to improve supply chain resilience.

UK households are less prepared for emergencies than those in several other countries such as Finland, Sweden and European Union nations, the NAO added.  It said ministers should encourage households to prepare for supply chain disruptions and learn from the approaches taken by other countries.

A number of rail journeys will be cancelled across Devon and Cornwall from next week due to recurring issues with a fleet of trains, a rail operator has said.
Great Western Railway (GWR) said five weekday services will be cancelled between Penzance and Plymouth/Exeter from Monday.

The issue is down to the company's Class 175 fleet, which it said had been "challenging from a reliability perspective," prompting too many cancellations for customers.
The operator said it understood the timetable changes would be "frustrating for customers" but believed the move would "provide a more reliable service in the short term" while it worked to bring its fleet up to standard.

The Class 175 trains entered service in 2000, when they were used by Transport for Wales.

GWR brought in 26 of them last year to replace older diesel trains, with hopes to reduce costs and pollution.

The trains, however, had been "out of service for a prolonged period" before transferring to GWR, "requiring more recommissioning work than anticipated", a spokesperson for the operator said.