Jubilee line a disgrace for the misery it causes commuters, says MP

Miranda Bryant12 April 2012

An MP has become the latest commuter to criticise the Jubilee line for its weekend closures and signal problems, branding it a "disgrace to London".

Former Croydon MP David Winnick said the line, which connects north London to Canary Wharf, had become so bad it has superseded the Northern as "the new misery line".

Mr Winnick, now Labour MP for Walsall North, uses the line on the journey from his constituency in the Midlands to the Houses of Parliament.

He said: "It is frequently delayed during the day which is why it has become the new misery line. There are hundreds of thousands of people who use the Tube daily to get to work and have no alternative who are constantly being held up.

"It's not occasionally, it's every single day. It's such an acute problem that you would've thought it was something that the Mayor would do something about, but he hasn't. It's a disgrace to London."

Many other commuters have written to the Evening Standard's letters page venting their frustration about the line. Last week three trains broke down during the morning peak. Figures published by the Standard revealed that the Jubilee line, which only opened fully in 1999 with a £3.5 billion extension, was disrupted by planned engineering works on 615 days up until the weekend of 25/26 September - not including repeated signal failures.

Transport for London said it had been working "day and night" to complete an upgrade on the line since it acquired failing maintenance company Tube Lines last summer. A TfL spokeswoman said: "We inherited a project in disarray, but in a few short months have ensured that the new automatic signalling system is now in use on much of the Jubilee line, with all trains on the line using it during passenger service.

"Significant progress has been made and the upgrade is on-track to be completed in spring this year."

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