James York, Edinburgh + ShareThis week’s announcement that the East Coast rail network has returned £1billion to the taxpayers’ purse should be a nail in the coffin for the madness of privatisation.
James York, Edinburgh + ShareThis week’s announcement that the East Coast rail network has returned £1billion to the taxpayers’ purse should be a nail in the coffin for the madness of privatisation.
Bring Back British Rail
1 day ago
Keith Williams, head of the UK government's Rail Review thinks there's 'no clear consensus' for public ownership of our railways. With recent polls showing 76% in favour, we beg to differ. Please ensure you sign and share our petition before the Rail Review deadline on Friday 31 May 2019. ...
Bring our railway into public ownership - tell Keith now
weownit.org.uk
Stop rail industry plans for *even more* privatisation!Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on Google PlusShare on Linked InShare by Email
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You can also respond to the Williams Rail Review consultation directly here https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/williams-rail-review
for any long distance ad hoc travel in the uk, especially for families, rail is financially the 4th option now.
The problem with the review is if he recommends renationalisation the government will ignore it.
Do any of you actually remember the railways under nationalisation. No funding, poor management. Out date rolling stock, closures of many maintenance yards and loss of jobs, horrendous safety record, do I need to go on. What we need to change is the way the railway contractors are managed. That's the way to ensure an efficient railway.
He won't because a) he's biased towards his tory paymasters, and b) he's an expert and any government appointed expert is going to be a Rupert that knows sod all about what they're looking after.
The British Industries should have been renationalised when tony blair took office. All British Industries need immediate renationalising NOW. GAS, ELECTRIC, WATER, BUSES and TRAINS. N O W !!
Why Grayling should go ? Not only has he failed with rail but has also failed in the Home Office with disastrous probation reforms.
You cannot Nationalise under EU Animal Farm Law....
Surely it can’t be stoopedad
Signed
He paid by Failing Grayling! So will report what he’s told to do
Surely the conclusion and findings have been written already. Or am I just getting pessimistic?
signed
Worst web design ever, I'm only fighting through this crap because it's important.
BRS for me HS2 is a white elephant
Tessa Padden, Iona PaDun, William Duncan, James Caldwell, Jamie West, Irene West and all those who ever worked or knew somebody who worked in the railways.
Has he got his fingers in his ears, eyes shut and singing la la? Public utilities should be just that I.e. public owned. Power, Water and sewage, health and core transport should be services not profit bases for overseas owners.
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Bring Back British Rail shared a post.
3 days ago
Thanks to Philip Alston for showing how much the privatisation and deregulation of our public transport has contributed to poverty and social isolation across the UK. Time to Bring Back British Rail and re-municipalise our buses now!
His report says: "The Special Rapporteur heard a great many complaints from people in rural areas that the privatisation and deregulation of public transport outside London had made trains unaffordable and led to many bus routes being cut. The resulting isolation and inability to afford basic transport had serious negative consequences in terms of access to jobs, schools, health care and community engagement. Local authorities have often simply abandoned their responsibilities by relegating key services to the private sector and failing to take any regulatory measures to ensure basic service provision. Abandoning people to the private market in relation to services that affect every dimension of their basic well-being, without guaranteeing their access to minimum standards, is incompatible with human rights requirements."NEW TODAY: We've just released our final report on our visit to the UK, which finds that the UK Government is doubling down on anti-poor policies, and that sustained cuts to social support violate the UK’s human rights obligations. Click here to read the report: https://undocs.org/A/HRC/41/39/Add.1 Today at 2pm in the UK, we will be taking questions and discussing the report live on Facebook. RSVP here: https://www.facebook.com/events/2473546979343728/ … ...
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Even MrsT was opposed to the privatization.
WI have talked about this and hope to be able to Find a solution. As long as London is ok it seems that the rest of us are ignored. Like so many things.
Right I will support re-nationalisation if the next Labour manifesto gives a guarantee the they will make it their first priority to lower fares by 3% year on year for their term of office.
WI have talked about this and hope to be able to Find a solution. As long as London is ok it seems that the rest of us are ignored. Like so many things.
BRS we want
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Bring Back British Rail
5 days ago
Dawn Foster writing for Jacobin Magazine on why Britain needs to re-nationalise its railways 🚆 Bring Back British Rail! Join our passenger-led campaign founded in 2009 bringbackbritishrail.org ...
Britain Must Take Back Richard Branson’s Awful Trains
jacobinmag.com
In 2017, pundits were shocked by Jeremy Corbyn's call to renationalize rail — and the broad public support that greeted it. You only need to board one of Richard Branson’s rolling torture chambers to see why.Share on FacebookShare on TwitterShare on Google PlusShare on Linked InShare by Email
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I caught a train in China, three weeks ago. I travelled from Beijing to Shanghai, a distance of 819 miles. I sat in the 16th carraige of 16, first class and it took five and three quarter hours. On the ticket it gave the price, 933 Yuan (about £105), the car 16, and my seat. There was nobody standing. Every time we stopped, the very long train fitted perfectly in the station platforms. The speed was shown on the wall, mostly well over 300 kilometres per hour. China Rail IS NOT a privatised railway
Going by them to Edinburgh tomorrow. Nice smooth quiet clean trains. Say what you want about Branson he gives value for money. He also treats his workers very well
Branson and all the other train operators put profit before service , if you look in the rest of the world train travel is the cheapest form of travel we have it so wrong , I love a train journey but just can’t take out a mortgage every time I want to go some where
Unfortunately It's gone to far too ever be possible to recreate the BR of professional Railwaymen and women. Like every industry that's been privitised. Lost the skills and experience of the professional team. And replaced by Anyone who has worked with professional proud BR staff will fully understand. The rest like everything else you haven't a clue. The future of the railway is Not very well. Unfortunately. Driverless train because it is safer I can see.
Better tell Branson GET IT SORTED OR LOOSE CONTRACT!
And WHO will be paying for Nationalization of NATIONAL GRID and now RAIL SERVICES and perhaps BRITISH STEEL cause "comrade" Corbyn wants to lend another £100bn if TAX PAYERS WITH VOTES ALLOW IT....we shall see!
Nottingham to portsmouth, change at London. What with delays, changing stations, some of them minor stations before London & 1 local rail strike. Took me 18hrs & 5days pay lost for being 2hrs adrift. I was in the royal navy. The year was 1977. British rail no thanks. This wasn,t the 1st time either.
Whilst I am all for renationalisation, I really cannot fault Virgjn West Coast. I’ve used them quite a bit and mostly been happy with punctuality and friendliness of staff.
in general i agree but have to say as a partick thistle season ticket holder living in cumbria i get a great service . from carlisle to glasgow central. cheap trains (£13/14 return clean , punctual and loads of room.
One fact most people don't know is Branson contracted out the maintenance of his Pendolino trains to a French company called Alstom who are now making hundreds of UK staff redundant.
How many commenting here actually use trains on a regular basis, I.e. as commuters or regular travellers ? I used Virgin between Birmingham and London as a daily commuter for around five years with little problem and at an average cost of £38.00 return without restriction.
And British Steel !
What's wrong with Virgin Trains? You can get a deal from London Euston to Dublin for £47 using them. An excellent travel day for those who don't want to fly where it costs £25 just for your bag.
I live on west coast main. Use the Virgin service fairly regularly to and from London and it is great. Using Northern Rail or TPE to get to Manchester or Barrow or Leeds is a NIGHTMARE!
Branson got too big for his boots ! The staff at the sharp end are amazing, it's the director level who just ain't got a clue about running a rail company ! Branson has no idea about the railway system and yes Re Nationalise the whole network and companies back into one big business
The trouble with nationalisation is that the tax payer will spend billions bringing the system up to scratch only for the Tories to flog it to their friends for nothing if they get back in power.
I think the writer isn't a train traveller
Virgin trains are the only ones id defend.. theyve always been cheaper, faster and more reliable then london midlands for me
You could buy a ticket from any station to any where not just Great Western on one track
Riddled with factual errors... poorly researched and badly written.
Brandon's Virgin is the best of train lines. West coast much improved If you want to knock privatisation of rail look at Northern or Arriva.
Literally no competition so how is it fertile ground for enterprise? Regulation is pointless it's essentially organised racketeering.
GWR trains are bad too. Very uncomfortable seats. The one I went on went from Penzance to Paddington, no buffet service, the toilet wasn't working (new train) and there were no seat reservations. The seat I had reserved was a forward facing seat, but the actual seat was backward facing at a table, so didn't mind that someone was sat there. These are apparently built by Hitachi.
Branson's trains are a joke. They're ludicrously expensive unless you book weeks in advance. He doesn't deserve a railway. He's a complete cut throat.
The class 390s don’t belong to virgin they are leased from angel trains so who runs the service would still have the same trains
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Bring Back British Rail shared a post.
4 weeks ago
Great to see our friends at We Own It ripping to shreds the Rail Delivery Group's new proposals on today's news. We need a re-unified railway run for people not profit! Join us at bringbackbritishrail.org
We Own It
The rail industry thinks more competition will solve the crisis in our railways. They're wrong. ...
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Read more about the Rail Delivery Group proposal here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-48096549
Surely they should be called the railway dividend grabbers
If I had my zealous views that rail privatisation works, what would the answer be ? It would have been complete figments of my imaginations.
https://www.railnews.co.uk/news/2019/05/13-new-gwr-iets-under-fire.html
The biggest problem with British Rail was successive governments weren't interested in it, particularly as a public service.
No public service runs well if it's privatised. Too many chiefs competing with one another and very little in the way of actual service provision. I do remember BR and it was better than this crippled system.
Ah yes, competition. I'm London based, so only one franchise goes through my station. It's clearly not that type of competition. It must be the other type where a potential franchisee will attempt to underbid the competition and then profit (Have less cash left to improve the service). It does sound attractive, the idea that those who don't travel on trains don't have to fund them, but once again, the franchisees are running at a profit or dumping them back on the public purse. So if a franchise can be profitable, surely it can be profitable in public hands. We have a situation currently where only unprofitable lines are paid for from taxes.
Well said we want it back in Public hands (OURS ) not the French, German or Dutch state
I'm sure there will be free market fanatics and "libertarians" screaming their empty little heads off about how the state should never be allowed to run anything and how incompetent governments are. Well, they have had their chance to "prove" how much better the unfettered free market supposedly is at running our railways. What they have consistently overlooked is the fact that true competition cannot and does not work as advertised on our rail network. Why? Because all privatisation actually did was to split up the network into a bunch of regional monopolies. There are hardly any instances where you can choose between train operators to take you from one station to another, and even when you do find a token example, there is no real difference in pricing anyway. The same is true for the bus network, where for any given area, there is usually only one company operating buses - so you can only choose between operators by moving from one county to another.
What you want is someone like Elon Musk running the railways but not in the private sector.
What she said was precise and accurate. Bring back British Rail, but properly funded (we could just give it the money we’re currently giving the franchises) and let it get on with running the railways.
In this interview they allowed the guy from the franchisees to suggest, unchallenged, that more freedom to them was the answer to our expensive not fit for purpose rail system, sure let's allow an obviously flawed group of operaters to have even greater autonomy, he also quoted how well some foreign railways are run, well once again he was unchallenged by the interviewee who failed to mention that many of our European partners actually do run UK railway franchises at great profit to them from UK taxpayers, I do not profess to know the answers to a modern honest good value railway but it's obvious that a public transport system should not be governed by profits and shareholders, as it is at present where profiteers can bid for franchises as with Virgin, take millions of tax payers money to help run them, then when it becomes less profitable, drop it leaving the UK tax payer once again with the bill, a Tory mantra!
We want proper rail transportation bring back BRS
"I wasn't alive when British Rail was operating". Wow, definitely feel old now!
She nailed it!!
Tired argument from the presenter using anecdote as history rather than knowing the facts and gets shut down by informed young woman.
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Bring Back British Rail shared a post.
4 weeks ago
Want to understand how privatisation has ruined Britain's bus network and how re-regulation can help make things better? Watch this brilliant new documentary from our friends at the Association of British Commuters, and join Better Buses for Greater Manchester and Get Glasgow Moving campaigning in two of our biggest cities. Watch the full film at: abcommuters.com/buses
Association of British Commuters
**EXCLUSIVE** After thirty years of privatisation, is it time to bring our buses under public control? Our new documentary discusses Greater Manchester's bus crisis and suggests that bus regulation could set a precedent for the entire country... Watch now: abcommuters.com/buses ...
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Renationalise all our infrastructure and our NHS! #ToriesOut
This has been Conservative party policy for over five decades. Cheaper fares and better services were never the aim, dividends for shareholders or private owners were.
Privatisation of the buses took them away from the many corporations who ran them successfully and put them all into the hands of Stagecoach and First National How is that leading to more competition?
Nottingham still has Nottingham City Transport https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nottingham_City_Transport
This is why our village now has one bus a week.
Bring back nbc
Stagecoach have ruined every bus service in the UK that they've taken over.
If you want people to use public transport instead of all the cars out there, then make it cheaper. Its obvious its over priced.
i live on the outskirts of tunbridge wells & it is now cheaper for 2 people to get a taxi into town, rather than pay arriva's casual bus fares.
We need a properly funded intergrated public transport system in every town, city and village.
The recent legislation whilst allowing a degree of local regulatory control over bus services, specifically does not allow local authorities to own the operating companies. This is falsely/naively stated in the video. It "generously" allows local authorities to continue funding the same corporate carpetbaggers who've destroyed the public service ethos of the bus industry. Govt rate capping has seen local public transport budgets massively slashed, often to 0%. The Bus Services Act 2017 was never anything other than a paper tiger, intended to deceive.
It makes me so angry that public transport isnt better regulated/renationalised. Its obvious to anyone eho catches trains that all the profits are not going back into maintaining the stations or buying decent train stock. i rarely use trains because they're so expensive but i was shocked today at how shabby the bristol to bath trains and stations are now, despite the rising fares and increases in passengers. Bristol buses are mostly in good condition but seem massively more expensive than other cities. Parking in oxford and use of park n ride buses for family of 4 all day is £6. In Bristol it costs me £8 for me and my 8yrold to get a day rider ticket (inner zone) without parking.
No deregulation in London. I wonder why not ?
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