The Greater Anglia rail franchise contest - down to the final three...

The East Anglia rail franchise has, in truth, not been a terribly happy experience for anyone - passengers or train operating company. Hampered by poor, aging infrastructure and equally poor, aging rolling stock, customer satisfaction has been low for the most part and the ever promised jam delayed by faulty points in the Westminster area.

And now, after the seizing of the franchise from National Express, only to be replaced by a twenty-nine month franchise to cover the gap whilst the Department for Transport worked out just how one might decide upon how to award a franchise having made such a bodge of the West Coast Main Line one, the final three contenders have been announced. So, what have we got?...

Firstly, Abellio East Anglia Ltd, a joint venture between Abellio (part of Nederlandse Spoorwegen) and Stagecoach. I'm not a huge fan of Stagecoach, but must admit that Abellio have done reasonably well since they took over. By improving cleaning, refurbishing trains and using social media, especially Twitter, well, the calamitous state of the infrastructure has been somewhat mitigated.

Next up, First East Anglia Ltd. Yes, it's those people that brought you 'Worst Great Western', a company so bad that passengers went on strike. And yes, they may well argue that they got better, but if they had got any worse, the franchise would surely have been taken away from them. Indeed, some might argue that it should have been.

And finally, National Express East Anglia Trains Ltd. What can I say, apart from repeating my fond wish that, having walked away from two franchises, they should never, ever, be allowed to run a railway service in this country again. When they ran the East Anglia franchise, they axed the award-winning restaurant service, sacked cleaners and customer service staff "in order to improve the customer experience" and were generally utterly useless. I can but hope that the only reason they made the final shortlist was because there were only three applicants.

So, given the choices, I would rather want Abellio/Stagecoach to win, as the prospects for my daily commute would not be rosy if either of the other bids were to be successful.

So, a polite reminder to the Department of Transport and, in particular, the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Transport, Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon (who, I see, appears to have no experience in transport policy), that if you screw this up, you will not have heard the last of it. There are plenty of Peers who use the East Anglian Main Line who will have much to say if their journeys are interrupted...