The number of people employed in the administration of DfT Operator, which runs nationalised passenger operators, is set to rise from 25 to 100 by the end of the coming year. DfTO was known as the Department for Transport’s Operator of Last Resort until last month.
Alex Hynes, the director-general at DfT Rail Services Group, told MPs on the Commons Transport Committee that DfT Operator would be increasing in size to deal with the growing workload caused by the nationalisation of three more former franchises during 2025, following the passing of the Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Act at the end of November, which means that renationalisation is no longer the last resort but the default option.
Four DfT contracts have already been returned to public ownership since 2018, when the Virgin Trains East Coast franchise failed and was replaced by LNER.
Since then the contracts for Northern, Southeastern and TransPennine Express have also been terminated, as well as Caledonian Sleeper, ScotRail and Transport for Wales, which are now run by the devolved governments.
The next in line is South Western Railway in May 2025, followed by c2c in July and Greater Anglia in the autumn. The remaining seven contracts still in the private sector are expected to have ended by 2027. After that, the only private sector passenger operators will be those with open access licences, such as Grand Central and Hull Trains. New open access operations are due to start soon, and further applications are now being considered by the Office of Rail and Road.