For all the criticism of the 21 it’s still a very busy profitable service and to say it’s empty past birtley simply isn’t true. Even off peak you’d be hard pressed to find a quiet service.

We shouldn’t be dragging other services down to promote others. We should be holding it up and saying this is what we need elsewhere

In the hands of franchising or a competent operator the 21 can be what it was in the guise of classic, the 221 and 723/4