Trainchat - The failure of privatisation in the British Railway

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Debate & Discussion > Trainchat - The failure of privatisation in the British Railway

Sri.Theo: Apr 16, 2008

Those barriers are pretty easy to get around if nobody's around. Just pull them towards you, slip in from the side and then push it forward to slip out the other side. They have plenty of space.

# ¿ May 14, 2012 13:46

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# ¿ May 12, 2024 15:45

Sri.Theo: Apr 16, 2008

quote:

RAIL UNION RMT today demanded that the review of franchising in the wake of the West Coast fiasco, being undertaken by Eurostar CEO Richard Brown, examine in full the cheaper and more efficient option of renationalisation. The DfT statement on the franchising review said:

The second independent review will be undertaken by Eurostar chairman Richard Brown CBE, and examine the wider rail franchising programme. It will look in detail at whether changes are needed to the way risk is assessed and to the bidding and evaluation processes, and at how to get the other franchise competitions back on track as soon as possible. This will report back by the end of December.

However, in striking out the popular option of public ownership, the Department has ignored the fact that Eurostar International Limited � which Richard Brown runs - is 40% owned by the UK Government/DfT (through London & Continental Railways Limited), 55% by the French Government and 5% by the Belgian Government. According to the company returns, it appears that Eurostar could pay dividends but doesn't, presumably because it's publicly owned, and the returns show that they haven't paid any dividends out up until March 2012.

RMT General Secretary Bob Crow said:
�In light to the West Coast fiasco it would be an absolute disgrace if the most popular option, public ownership, was ignored. Not least because the man carrying out the review runs a fully state-owned railway.

�Opinion polls and online surveys now show that between 70 and 90% of the British people support full renationalisation of the railways.

�It�s not the evaluation or the franchising model that�s wrong, it�s the whole greed-driven, free-for-all of privatisation that has brought Britain�s railways to their knees and turned us into a global laughing stock.

�Some shabby little whitewash that doesn�t examine the cheaper and more efficient model of public ownership would doom us to repeat the failures on the West Coast time and time again until the political class wake up to reality.�
ENDS

Got this from the RMT this morning.

# ¿ Oct 9, 2012 09:14

Sri.Theo: Apr 16, 2008

Yeah but in certain situations automatic trains can be just as safe as regular ones. The copenhagen metro system is tiny but fantastic. There should be no safety issues automating a line like Waterloo and City.

# ¿ Oct 11, 2012 09:02

Sri.Theo: Apr 16, 2008

How do you guys distinguish between the Overground and the overground railways in everyday speech? I find it a very annoying name.

# ¿ Jul 2, 2013 21:02

Sri.Theo: Apr 16, 2008

Can anyone post the link to the long article about railway privitisation, I think it was in the Guardian. But it explicitly discussed the details of what happened, along with the consultants promising technology that didn't exist yet (moving monitoring sensors or something?) and the gutting of the British Rail engineering corp?

I would appreciate it as I lost all my bookmarks recently and it was handy to have.

# ¿ Jul 9, 2013 17:06

Sri.Theo: Apr 16, 2008

Does anyone have any information on health and safety for workers before and after the health and safety act (1974) or whichever act applied to the railway system?

I'm particularly in interested in people's experiences or if it made any difference to the amount of deaths and injuries.

# ¿ Aug 5, 2013 18:13

Sri.Theo: Apr 16, 2008

thehustler posted:

Is this really a fair comparison, though? Obviously lots of people in London use the Tube because it's pretty much the only viable option.

Not saying I love franchising, by the way, just playing devils advocate.

That was his exact point.

# ¿ Aug 16, 2013 14:23

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# ¿ May 12, 2024 15:45

Sri.Theo: Apr 16, 2008

So how should performance on the trains be measured? Do you think that PPM and CaSL are correct?

I'm all in favour of weighting it based on passenger usage but can see how that would piss stone people off.

# ¿ Sep 20, 2015 10:43

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