Rail services across the country have been cancelled in the run-up to Christmas as rising numbers of staff fall ill with Covid.
He said that with a train driver responsible for up to 10 trains on a shift, just a few people off sick could make it "challenging to run a reliable service". The director general of the British Chambers of Commerce, Shevaun Haviland, said the new rules would be welcomed by many firms which had been "wrestling with staff shortages throughout the winter".