The rail operator Northern has said it still uses fax machines to communicate vital messages to train crews.

The train company made the admission at an extraordinary meeting of the rail north committee, chaired by the mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, on Wednesday morning at which Northern was asked to account for its poor performance, including repeated “do not travel” messages issued to passengers on Sundays.

Burnham asked one of the two Northern officials present: “I’ve heard you’re still using fax machines. Can that possibly be true?”

The official replied: “It is very much true,” prompting an incredulous Burnham to ask: “How on earth is that the case in 2024?”

When asked by Burnham why Northern could not get rid of fax machines “tomorrow”, the official replied: “The tools we use to get messaging and information to our crew rely on faxes, amazingly.”

He added: “It is our challenge to get rid of them. It’s in our plans to get rid of them.”

The second official present at the meeting suggested it would need the agreement of trade unions to switch to digital technology. “We wouldn’t be able to get rid of them tomorrow without an agreement with our trade unions,” she said. “So we have to look at these issues with the depth and complexity that they have.”

In response, Burnham said: “Personally, I don’t think many people watching this would imagine replacing fax machines as issues of depth and complexity, and while it may need agreement with trade unions, people would just say … well, why wasn’t that done years ago?”

Other issues raised by Burnham and the mayor of West Yorkshire, Tracy Brabin, included high numbers of cancellations, and concerns about poor rail services affecting local economies in the run-up to Christmas and having an impact on footfall at Christmas markets in Manchester and at Halifax’s Piece Hall.

Burnham said: “One hundred and fifty-five trains have been cancelled this morning. That’s thousands of people late into work, changing their day. And that is a lot of disruption, a huge amount. What really worries me is you do not appear to have a plan in place for these cancelations.”

The Northern officials were asked about fines being issued in court to people who had mistakenly bought the wrong ticket, a high sickness rate among staff, and a failure to put in place ticket acceptance agreements on other lines when Northern services are cancelled.

“We absolutely have changed our position on penalty fares,” the second Northern official said. “We have paused prosecutions on a number of penalty fares where we understand that the ticketing is very complex and complicated for customers.”

The first official said Northern had a long-term plan, which “is in months and years”, and would seek to address the various issues.

He said: “If at 5.30 this morning I’m looking at loads of cancellations, how am I, how are we, getting that right, whilst also sorting fax machines out, sorting the structure of the timetable out, reorganising the business so that it fits the local agenda?

“All of those are on the list. All of those are being worked on … but they’re not problems that can be fixed tomorrow.”