Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Economy and Transport and North Wales – in the Senedd at 1:35 pm on 7 October 2020.
Minister, the reason given by rail operators for the lack of a train link from the Ebbw Vale line into Newport has been that train capacity was fully taken up by the service into Cardiff. Minister, given the fact that the use of public transport has fallen dramatically since the onset of the COVID pandemic, has any thought been given to open trial train journeys into Newport, in preparation for a full service? Notwithstanding that there are delays in the procurement of rolling stock, which we acknowledge are outside the hands of the Welsh Government, surely there is now sufficient spare capacity to make these trials possible.