Train reliability across the country has reached the worst level on record in recent weeks, with two operators serving Lancashire performing poorly.

Analysis of Office of Rail and Road (ORR) data found the cancellations score for all operators during the four weeks up to January 7 was eight per cent.

This is double the proportion from the previous for weeks and represents the poorest reliability on record dating back to April 2014.

Northern, which serves East Lancs towns such as Blackburn, Burnley, and Accrington, recorded a cancellations score of eight per cent, with 853 trains part-cancelled and 1,810 trains cancelled in full.

Chris Jackson, regional director at Northern, said: “We recognise there were a greater number of cancellations over Christmas and the New Year and we are sorry for the disruption and inconvenience caused.

“Those cancellations were the result of a high level of sickness absence - twice the industry average - and the industrial action that took place in December and early January.

"We are now operating our new timetable and seeing an improving picture.

“Indeed, since Monday, January 9, we have seen an almost threefold reduction in the number of cancellations across our 2,500 daily services.”

Avanti West Coast, which whose trains connect Lancashire with London and Scotland, cancelled the equivalent of about one in five services and registered a cancellations score of 18.9 per cent – one of the highest figures recorded for any operator.

Cancellations scores reflect the percentage of services that are either fully or part-cancelled, with part-cancellations countered as half a full cancellation.

The impact felt by passengers is even worse, as the statistics do not include services removed from timetables as late as 10pm on the previous night.

Avanti – a joint venture between First Group (70 per cent) and Italian state operator Trenitalia (30 per cent) was given until April 1 by the Department for Transport to improve its services when it was awarded a short-term contract extension in October 2022.

Its timetable was slashed in August last year to cut short-notice cancellations after a sharp decline in the number of drivers voluntarily working on rest days for extra pay.

There was a huge uplift in planned services when a new timetable was introduced on December 11, but this was followed by poor reliability.

A spokesperson for Avanti West Coast said cancellations were high in the four weeks leading up to January 7 due to a lack of train crew availability.

Specifically for the Preston/Scotland services, they were unable to run services to and from Scotland during the first week of January due to a landslip in Carstairs, South Lanarkshire.

They added: “We know customers have not been getting the service they deserve and we’re sorry for that.

“Our new timetable, introduced in December, greatly increased the number of services we’re running and customers are seeing the benefits of that with more seats and more frequent services.

“Performance is steadily improving and we’re running far more services than we were in the autumn.”

Last week out of the 1,737 trains booked to run across the whole Avanti network, six per cent were cancelled due to traincrew issues.