My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Some of the changes dramatically affect his constituents. If he can stay until later in my speech, he will hear me refer to one of them. If he cannot, I understand fully, as I know that he has other commitments in the House this afternoon.

I want the Minister-and the Secretary of State, who I trust will read this debate in the Official Report-to hear from the mouths of the travelling public precisely what they think of his Department, Southeastern trains and Govia. Michael Alderton, a gold card season ticket holder, says:

"The introduction of the High Speed (?) service to the timetable is a shambles and highlights the lack of consideration of SE Trains for commuters...I have had to start getting this earlier service because the later train (6.44) is regularly late and at work I do not have the luxury of being allowed a five-minute window".

Five minutes, of course, is the amount by which trains are allowed to be late without being regarded as late.

Working up the line from Margate-a two-hour journey on a good day-Vivien Viggers says:

"The introduction of this service and the downgrading of the original service to Cannon Street and Victoria has been of little use to me. Because there are no trains at Westgate in the morning at 6 am, I now have to walk to Margate. Whereas I could walk to my workplace from Cannon Street, I now have to take a tube...the journey is no quicker and I have been forced to pay the inflated fares for no improvement in service."

One stop further on, in Westbrook, Paul Dexter writes that

"a new trend that is becoming more frequent is that when a train is running late on the return journey...Southeastern are not stopping at a number of stations between Faversham and Ramsgate to enable them to make up time (presumably so they can meet their targets)...customers for smaller stations between Faversham and Ramsgate have to terminate their journey at Faversham and suffer a further delay...whilst we wait for the next train to come through."

Mr. Dexter, who pays £3,780 a year out of taxed income for his season ticket, adds:

"It's all the more difficult to take increases to the price for this year on the basis of the vastly deteriorating service we have received since the new timetable came into place...The delays may not sound significant...but...the impact it has on the time I have to spend with a young family in the evenings is."

Dawn Dale, who travels from Birchington-on-Sea, asks:

"Why are they running a 'high speed' service on a line that...cannot reach any high speeds until it leaves the commuter line at Ebbsfleet and the trains only get into London 10 minutes earlier than they would on the main line-time that you then have to spend getting back to where you need to be?...When are Southeastern going to admit that they have made a mistake on this line"?

I would add: when will the Minister?

The next stop is Herne Bay. Sharon Reeve pays £4,150 out of a salary of £26,000 to get to work. Because of the changes to the timetable she has to

"rise at 04:30 to catch a 05:35 train which will deliver me to London for 07:07-where upon I will have nearly ONE WHOLE HOUR before I need to start work."

She goes on:

"If I lose my job through being late for work I will be another 'benefit' statistic, and if I have to take a local job, I will join the low paid, be unable to pay tax.

Why is the government not stepping in, to ensure that those of us willing to work, are able to get to work"?

Moving up the line to Teynham, Duncan Law used to catch the 5.27 to London Bridge and get to his Greenwich office by 7 am. Now

"the train doesn't stop at my Local Station, meaning I have to travel to Sittingbourne and pay £4.50 per day just to park".

He goes on:

"The train from Sittingbourne is NOT direct to London Bridge or Cannon Street anymore, you have to change at Gillingham onto a local train to complete your journey."

He concludes by saying that he is

"so angry and let down" by Southeastern.

Antony Loveland from Faversham works in north-west London, an area that the Department says is favoured by the run-through to St. Pancras. He says that

"the St. Pancras terminal is of limited use to me. Furthermore, I would be required to find an extra £1400-£1500 for my annual season ticket if I were to use the 'high speed' service which only gains me 6 minutes each way. I find it difficult to see how Southeastern can deem this value for money."

He concludes:

"Whilst I'm sure it had its drawbacks I would welcome a return of the old timetable".

We now move towards the Constituency represented by the Under-Secretary of State for Transport, Paul Clark, who presumably speaks occasionally to the Secretary of State. Dennis Hamer from Newington tells me that he faces

"a reduced number of trains in peak hours" and 50 per cent. fewer trains during off-peak hours. He adds:

"Needless to say these journeys take considerably longer than under the old timetable".

Neil West, who lives on Sheppey and works in Fulham, says that

"the new timetable has increased my journey to work from 2 hrs to 2 hrs 20 minutes and the journey home from 2 hrs to 2 hrs 30 minutes on a normal day. I have lost almost an hour of my own free time each day."

And so to Gillingham and Rainham, home of the Under-Secretary, who wrote on 1 March to his constituent, Jennifer Coles, saying that he had met with Southeastern's Charles Horton, who was

"very quick to acknowledge Southeastern's disappointment with regard to the general performance of the service."

Mr. Horton had stressed that

"Southeastern's entire focus is currently being directed at driving up performance levels".

Faced across the table by a Transport Minister defending a marginal seat and beset by angry commuters, he would say that. The Minister went on to sing from the Department song sheet:

"I do believe that the high-speed rail service is a great asset for the residents of Medway and that it will provide increased opportunity for the area. I hope that in time, and with the return to high performance levels of your standard commuting services, you will begin to think so too."

It is debatable whether Amy Overy from Rainham, another constituent of the Under-Secretary, will be impressed by his observations. She said that

"the Medway Towns are worse off from the new HS1 service!"

She went on:

"I do not want to hear that commuters are better off elsewhere in Kent, because I don't live elsewhere and I don't want to move either. I want a reliable service to and from London Victoria, in less than an hour, which is what I could expect before the timetable changes in December 2009."

Interestingly, the Minister got the Department's franchise manager, John MacQuarrie, to reply to that comment. Mr. MacQuarrie said that

"the Department will review jointly with Southeastern how successful the implementation of December 2009 timetable has been."

"Successful" is perhaps not the word I would have chosen.

I appreciate that this debate is a lengthy journey. If the Minister is beginning to lose the will to live, perhaps he understands how Kent's travelling public feel on a daily basis. In case he is tempted to think that this problem affects just a few people on the line that is the subject of the debate, Daniel Sargent states:

"I commute to London Cannon Street everyday from Dover and my journey has been increased by 20 minutes in the evening, it now takes 2 hours in total."