Off track

Clearly, former operator National Express ran the route in lamentable style but it is Lord Adonis who has questions to answer over the handling and timing of nationalisation.

The claim by the Conservatives, that the peer knew of National Express East Coast's problems earlier than suggested, is very serious. It has not yet been proved, however, and that is one of several reasons why an inquiry is needed.

National Express' stewardship of the line ground to a halt after it paid too much, 1.3bn; was unable to bring enough passengers on board and then failed to see the recession coming.

There is clearly a lot more information to come out about what went wrong, what it told the Department for Transport privately and what Lord Adonis did in response. The best time for an inquiry is not now, however, because the priority has to be finding a private sector operator to take on the route – and sparing taxpayers any more strain on their already over-burdened pockets.