[Archived] Speed Camera's Again

[jim mk2]

Under this Labour government, the cost of using rail travel has gone through the roof. I had an unplanned trip to London a couple of weeks ago, got on the train in Darwen and was promptly relieved of 390 quid for the return ticket.

For the same money I could have driven down and paid for all the petrol, the M6 toll and 5 speeding fines.

I'm not surprised. Rail fares are cheap if you book in advance or travel outside the peak using discount cards but the cost of peak walk-on fares is ludicrous and makes the rail industry look very silly.

But it's late at night and I refuse to get started on the botched rail privatisation or I will go into full rant mode.

Oh, and for your information, the privatisation of the railways was carried out out by the Tories in the dying days of a sleazy government led by the over-promoted bank clerk John Major.

[yoda]

I'm not surprised. Rail fares are cheap if you book in advance or travel outside the peak using discount cards but the cost of peak walk-on fares is ludicrous and makes the rail industry look very silly.

But it's late at night and I refuse to get started on the botched rail privatisation or I will go into full rant mode.

Oh, and for your information, the privatisation of the railways was carried out out by the Tories in the dying days of a sleazy government led by the over-promoted bank clerk John Major.

and how long have your friends had to put it right?

[thenodrog]

and how long have your friends had to put it right?

Long enough without even showing the desire or intention of even trying. Basically the empty rhetoric spewed out by the opposition in the 80's and 90's about re-nationalisation has proven to be precisely that ........ as I guess we all knew at the time and which even old Trotsky Jimski cannot deny or defend.

[den]

and how long have your friends had to put it right?

They are private companies Yoda.

How strange that would be though, tories on here asking for the railways to be re-nationalised.

[jim mk2]

They are private companies Yoda.

How strange that would be though, tories on here asking for the railways to be re-nationalised.

The railways have been renationalised in all but name in that they are now managed from Whitehall at a micro level with civil servants working out timetables in a way that would never have happened under BR, NetworkRail is a "not for profit" quasi-private / public company financed by government and because of the botched Tory privatisation the franchised train operating companies receive a far larger public subsidy than BR ever did.

But don't tell Gordon and the Chinese twerp.

[thenodrog]

The railways have been renationalised in all but name in that they are now managed from Whitehall at a micro level with civil servants working out timetables in a way that would never have happened under BR, NetworkRail is a "not for profit" quasi-private / public company financed by government and because of the botched Tory privatisation the franchised train operating companies receive a far larger public subsidy than BR ever did.

But don't tell Gordon and the Chinese twerp.

C'mon Jimsky .........

1. Are the railways efficient?

2. Do they compare with those of other similar economic powers?

3. Do you think they represent value for money?

4. Do they compete with other forms of transport?

5. Could they be better?

6. Do they benefit our economy?

7. Are governments in place to make decisions on behalf of the nation and to the greater good?

8. Which party has formed the government for way in excess of a decade now?

[yoda]

They are private companies Yoda.

How strange that would be though, tories on here asking for the railways to be re-nationalised.

I didn't ask for them to be nationalised, I asked how long jim's friends had had, to do what they said they were going to do, I am not a tory either, and jim I live in France so your reference to Chinese twerp is way off the mark.

It would be safe to say that you are the twerp from a nursing home though

[AlanK]

I watched comic relief the other night. I was inspired by the gang of celebs that climbed Kilimanjaro. Thought it my be fun for me and her to climb Ben Nevis. Checked out the rail prices to Fort William and decided it would be cheaper to climb a mountain in Africa! This island of ours is effed up beyond belief. How can I get a return flight abroad so much cheaper than a rail ticket on the same rock of land???????????

[broadsword]

They are private companies Yoda.

So are the banks.

[ABBEY]

I watched comic relief the other night. I was inspired by the gang of celebs that climbed Kilimanjaro. Thought it my be fun for me and her to climb Ben Nevis. Checked out the rail prices to Fort William and decided it would be cheaper to climb a mountain in Africa! This island of ours is effed up beyond belief. How can I get a return flight abroad so much cheaper than a rail ticket on the same rock of land???????????

and another bloody 2p tax on a litre of fuel from april!!!!!!

[stuwilky]

Under this Labour government, the cost of using rail travel has gone through the roof. I had an unplanned trip to London a couple of weeks ago, got on the train in Darwen and was promptly relieved of 390 quid for the return ticket.

Didnt you pay Virgin trains rather than the government?

[Flopsy]

try going through Megabus' website, you can get dirt cheap train tickets if you're travelling on the right days

[Tris]

Didnt you pay Virgin trains rather than the government?

Which will help Virgin Trains pay the goverment its franchise commitment. The way the goverment has run the railway in this country is a national disgrace. Flawed franchising strategy, flawed procurement strategy, neglect, indecision, the industry is neither privatised nor nationalised, walk-up fares are the most expensive in the world, Britain's train building capacity is in effect dead (even Bombardier in Derby is foreign owned) ...

Contrast that with how Germany and Switzerland run their public transport infrastructure (and build all their own trains) and it makes you weep.

Even France does a better job than us, despite SNCF blatently riding roughshod over EU rules on competition and a national rail strike kicking off at any slight suggestion they should modernise.

Flopsy - of course there are ways of getting cheap tickets. I regularly split my journey home from London by changing trains (and companies) somewhere en route, it can save #100 a journey.

However the current pricing for walk-up tickets does not tempt anyone out of their cars, and is even becoming uncompetitive next to air. That is not the right message.

[stuwilky]

Couldnt agree more, but is far more to do with profiteering private companies than the government.

If only the railways were state run (albeit not very well - at least that bit would be the same).

As a side note - I cannot believe someone tried to tell you how to travel for less. Even I wouldnt be so bold!

[colin]

Speed cameras.

Big yellow boxes with signs

[Tris]

Couldnt agree more, but is far more to do with profiteering private companies than the government.

I'm afraid not. This goverment should have renationalised the railways as promised, but chose not to. They have developed a ridicuolous, convoluted model whereby they pay certain operators to run some trains, and milk other operators for the privilege of running other trains.

The GNER farce illustrated it perfectly - the supposed "profiteering" private company had to relinquish the East Coast franchise because they couldn't afford the payments back to the government, so taxpayers money kept the whole line running pending Whitehall handing it over to National Express. Who are now stripping away all the elements which tempted business customers away from planes and on to trains in a desperate effort to meet goverment set targets - or lose the franchise.

With all such pay or be paid figures built on back room bureacrat forecasts as reliable as this governments forecasts in the wider economy - cue Mr Darling.

Decision making is so complicated that it takes twice as long as it should to develop and implement projects which could benefit the national system, and franchising is so short term that none of the chosen franchise operators will ever bother with long term investment strategies which would bring real benefits.

[thenodrog]

Speed cameras.

Big yellow boxes with signs

err.......... What are you on tonight Colin?

[jim mk2]

I'm afraid not. This goverment should have renationalised the railways as promised, but chose not to. They have developed a ridicuolous, convoluted model whereby they pay certain operators to run some trains, and milk other operators for the privilege of running other trains.

I stand to be corrected but Labour to my knowledge have never pledged to renationalise the railways.

And Labour did not "develop a ridicuolous, convoluted model ..." because they did not privatise the railways, the Tories did ! Or to be more specific, privatisation was the brainchild of civil servant named Steve Robson who persuaded the John Major government that it would be a good idea to break the old BR up into a thousands of different parts.

Labour inherited this unworkable mess in 1997 with admittedly grandiose plans to revolutionise rail travel but within a few years had to contend with a spate of horrific crashes resulting from years of under-investment in the infrasctructure and the collapse of Railtrack that paralysed the whole system.

The GNER farce illustrated it perfectly - the supposed "profiteering" private company had to relinquish the East Coast franchise because they couldn't afford the payments back to the government, so taxpayers money kept the whole line running pending Whitehall handing it over to National Express. Who are now stripping away all the elements which tempted business customers away from planes and on to trains in a desperate effort to meet goverment set targets - or lose the franchise.

GNER made a ludicrously generous bid to keep the franchise that it needed only a small downturn in passenger numbers for their business model to fall apart, which it duly did.

With all such pay or be paid figures built on back room bureacrat forecasts as reliable as this governments forecasts in the wider economy - cue Mr Darling.

Is this relevant ?

Decision making is so complicated that it takes twice as long as it should to develop and implement projects which could benefit the national system, and franchising is so short term that none of the chosen franchise operators will ever bother with long term investment strategies which would bring real benefits.

Chiltern were given a 20-year franchise some years ago and have made huge improvement to the Marylebone - Birmingham line, showing that franchising can work.

And talking of Steve Robson (who was knighted for his services to destroying the railway industry and costing the taxpayer billions of pounds) he retired from the civil service some years ago and joined the board of RBS.

Enough said. The man should be in court.

[stuwilky]

I'm afraid not. This goverment should have renationalised the railways as promised, but chose not to. They have developed a ridicuolous, convoluted model whereby they pay certain operators to run some trains, and milk other operators for the privilege of running other trains.

Did they pledge to do it? From recollection (albeit a hazy one) there was some potential proposals drawn up but never actually pledged.

And GNER were stripped of the franchise, but again, that had far more to do with the US (or Caribbean of somewhere that side of the Atlantic anyway) parent company filing for bankruptcy than the franchise payments.

And dont get me started on subsidies.

The railways should never have been privatised, on that we agree.

[broadsword]

Is there anyone out there who believes they should've been privatised?

[thenodrog]

And dont get me started on subsidies.

The railways should never have been privatised, on that we agree.

Wouldn't public ownership of the railways result in even more subsidies? It usually did.

The 'bonfire' scenario where something consumes all that is thrown on it at an ever increasing rate is probably one of the reasons why they were privatised in the first place.

[thenodrog]

Labour inherited this unworkable mess in 1997 with admittedly grandiose plans to revolutionise rail travel but within a few years had to contend with a spate of horrific crashes resulting from years of under-investment in the infrasctructure and the collapse of Railtrack that paralysed the whole system.

Isn't that the very reason that a responsible government should have intervened Jimsky?

[jim mk2]

Wouldn't public ownership of the railways result in even more subsidies? It usually did.

The 'bonfire' scenario where something consumes all that is thrown on it at an ever increasing rate is probably one of the reasons why they were privatised in the first place.

The railways were privatised for one reason only : political ideology. BR received only a fraction of public subsidy that is consumed by the privatised railway because its managers were so adept at running its decrepit system on a shoestring as they had for the previous 40 years.

[jim mk2]

Isn't that the very reason that a responsible government should have intervened Jimsky?

They did - then transport minister Stephen Byers (remember him) abolished Railtrack, disenfranchising shareholders and setting up the "not-for-profit" company Network Rail. Railtrack shareholders kicked up an enormous fuss and the dispute is still going through the courts even now.

Labour might have wanted to renationalise the railways but probably balked at the legal complexities and cost of putting back together the myriad different companies created from the old BR. They could do it with Railtrack because of the public furore over the company after the 2000 Hatfield crash.

[thenodrog]

The railways were privatised for one reason only : political ideology. BR received only a fraction of public subsidy that is consumed by the privatised railway because its managers were so adept at running its decrepit system on a shoestring as they had for the previous 40 years.

More than a bit of deserted political ideaology and a serious dose of backtracking and broken promises since 95 .....

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/blair...on-1567308.html

I guess promises really are meant to be broken eh?