A Vision for Scotland’s Railways
28th October 2021 | Evidence
In advance of COP26 – the UN Climate Summit in Glasgow, Scotland’s Rail Unions came together to release their new report A Vision for Scotland’s Railways.
The report highlights the vital role that rail plays in addressing the climate emergency, and lays out a long-term vision for a “world-class rail service that is fully staffed, with affordable fares, stations that are accessible and trains that are clean, green and attractive.” Well worth a read!
GB Rail Report
17th March 2020 | Evidence
The GB Rail Report – researched and written by our friends at Transport for Quality of Life and published as a Labour opposition whitepaper on 17 March 2020 – offers the most detailed plan we have seen so far for re-unifying our railways under public ownership.
The report defines a new governance structure for our national rail network, which is able to achieve both a central ‘guiding mind’ and long-term strategy (40 years), as well as devolved planning, delivery and control for all devolved regions and nations of Great Britain.
It manages to overcome many of the flaws of the old British Rail – its over-centralisation and lack of passenger representation at a strategic level (not to mention its chronic underfunding!) – and maps out how we can transition from our current privatised structure to a new wholly publicly-owned railway, which can be run in the interests of the British people in the most cost effective way. Well worth a read!
Why we need publicly-owned railways to address the climate emergency
3rd December 2019 | Evidence
Below is an extract from A Radical Transport Response to the Climate Emergency – the excellent new report by our friends at Transport for Quality of Life, which explains why taking our railways back into public ownership is an urgent climate issue.
Extract
It is worth explaining why we believe that changing the structure of the railway so that it is a single entity operating under public control is necessary in the context of a climate emergency, as the very live debate about the structure of the railways has not been framed in the context of action on climate change. There are four reasons why we believe that the current poor governance of the railway is a climate issue.
First, under the present system, Network Rail receives bids for train paths from train operators and has to try its best to fit them together. This is rather like trying to form a coherent picture from random pieces of different jigsaw puzzles. Network Rail has no power to design the most operationally-efficient timetable, or to create the most attractive offer to travellers. Were it to try to do this, it might receive legal challenges about access rights from the train operating companies or the Office of Rail and Road. Exacerbating this, the specification for each franchise is made in isolation and with little or no consultation with Network Rail, precluding a system-wide approach to timetabling. This means that it is next-to-impossible under the current structure of the railways to create a Swiss-style integrated clock-face timetable, which is essential as part of a universal, comprehensive public transport network.
Second, under the current structure of the railways, ticket purchase for anything but a straightforward journey with a single train operating company is excessively complex, and this, together with the high cost of rail travel, deters many people from travelling by train.
Third, fragmentation of the railway between multiple competing train operating companies means that when things go wrong, the passenger is often stuck in the middle: trains are not held to meet delayed services run by other operators (even if the delay is of a few minutes), and a ticket for one operator’s trains may not be accepted by another. Again, this means that people feel that they cannot trust public transport, and so they travel by car.
Finally, there is no objective for the railway to be run in a way that reduces carbon emissions – and nor can there be, because ‘the railway’, as a single entity, does not exist. These problems are structural, and it is only by changing the structure of the railway so that it is a single entity operating under public control, in the public interest, and with an objective to act in such a way as to reduce carbon emissions from transport to the greatest extent possible, that they can be resolved.
Transport for Quality of Life has carried out research in this area and is of the view that public ownership is necessary to achieve this. Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace have not carried out research in this area so do not have a position on public ownership, but do believe that the structure of the railway needs to change to be managed as a single entity and under public control.
Extract from A Radical Transport Response to the Climate Emergency (p.14) by Lynn Sloman and Lisa Hopkinson, Transport for Quality of Life
People’s Public Transport Policy
5th June 2019 | Evidence
This great new report on the Public Ownership of Public Transport by our friends at We Own It is the first chapter in a six part People’s Public Transport Policy being developed by the International Transport Workers’ Federation.
A Public Future for Scotland’s Railways
28th November 2017 | Evidence
As part of the campaign for the Public Ownership of Scotland’s Railway, this report by our friends at Common Weal & TSSA highlights the failures of ScotRail’s private train operator Abellio and the opportunities for passengers for taking it back into public ownership.
A Better Railway for Britain: A Report by Bring Back British Rail
1st October 2016 | Evidence
Bring Back British Rail’s first report A Better Railway for Britain: Re-unifying our railways under public ownership was launched in the Houses of Parliament in London on 13 October 2016.
Print copies are available to order in advance for just £5 (including free delivery in the UK), with all proceeds supporting campaign materials and activities.
The Four Big Myths of Rail Privatisation
1st June 2015 | Evidence / News
Read this report from our friends at Action for Rail! It’s all the evidence you need that rail privatisation has failed to deliver what they promised it would in the ’90s:
- • reduction in government subsidies (we now subsidise rail by nearly three times more than we did as British Rail)
- • cheaper tickets (rail fares have risen by 24% in real terms since privatisation)
- • innovation and investment (90% of the investment in the railways has come from public money)
Rail Privatisation: A Timeline of Failures
1st April 2015 | Evidence / News
A special edited and updated version of Rail Privatisation: A Timeline of Failures (below) – based on the design of British Rail’s 1979 ‘Go Direct by Inter-City‘ poster – features in A Better Railway for Britain: Bring Back British Rail’s first report, launched in October 2016.
Today marks 21 years since the enactment of the Railways Act (1993), on 1 April 1994, which unleashed rail privatisation on the poor unfortunate public. Since then, Britain’s privatised railways have been beset by a series of failures, scandals and fatal crashes, each at great expense to taxpayers.
19 September 1997 – A collision between two trains at Southall kills seven people and injures 139. A passenger train running at high speed with defective Automatic Warning System equipment, a fundamentally important safety system, passed a signal at ‘danger’ and collided with a freight train crossing its path. Great Western Trains was fined £1.5 million for violations of health and safety law relating to this accident.
1 December 1998 – A report by the National Audit Office into the flotation of the national railway infrastructure company, Railtrack, found that taxpayers lost £1.5 billion because of the government’s decision to ignore the Public Accounts Committee’s recommendation to sell its shares in stages, opting instead to sell them all at once.
5 October 1999 – A near head-on collision between two passenger trains at Ladbroke Grove, outside London Paddington station, kills 31 people and injures more than 52. A signal with a bad safety record was passed at ‘danger’. A poor standard of driver training by Thames Trains was cited as a major contributory factor.
17 October 2000 – A train running at high speed derails at Hatfield when a rail affected by rolling contact fatigue fractures under its wheels. Four passengers were killed and 70 were injured. The crash exposed the major stewardship shortcomings of the privatised Railtrack plc and the failings of the regulatory oversight of the company (principally, failure to ensure that it had a good knowledge of the condition of its assets) which ultimately triggered its partial renationalisation. Following the crash, Railtrack imposed more than 1,200 emergency speed restrictions across its network, since it did not have the knowledge to predict where rolling contact fatigue might hit next.
24 October 2000 – Connex loses its South Central franchise after a decision by the Strategic Rail Authority to re-let the franchise following criticism of Connex’s poor customer service and poor financial management.
7 October 2001 – In the face of severe financial difficulties, Railtrack plc is placed into railway administration by the Labour government’s Transport Secretary, Stephen Byers. This leads to an explosion of costs and a severe drop in performance. Railtrack was subsequently replaced by Network Rail.
10 May 2002 – A train derails at Potters Bar, killing seven people and injuring 76. A poorly maintained set of points was to blame, the maintenance of which was the responsibility of the private sector railway maintenance contractor Jarvis (who had tried to blame the accident on ‘sabotage’). Eight years later, Jarvis and Network Rail (having taken on Railtrack’s liabilities) were both charged under the Health and Safety at Work Act. Network Rail subsequently took track maintenance back in-house.
27 June 2003 – The Connex South Eastern franchise is terminated by the Strategic Rail Authority, citing the company’s poor performance and financial management.
15 December 2006 – GNER is stripped of its East Coast franchise by the Department for Transport, having fallen into financial difficulties and unable to meet the terms of its franchise.
13 November 2009 – National Express gives up the East Coast franchise (which it had taken over from GNER) owing to financial difficulties, having accumulated more than £1 billion of debt. The failure of this franchise deprived the Department for Transport of between £330 million and £380 million of revenue.
15 August 2012 – The Department for Transport announces FirstGroup plc as the winner of the InterCity West Coast franchise, prompting the incumbent franchise holder, Virgin, to seek a judicial review of the franchise decision.
3 October 2012 – The government announces the cancellation of the InterCity West Coast franchise competition after finding significant technical flaws in the bidding process, rescinding its decision to award the franchise to FirstGroup. The Public Accounts Committee found that civil servants had made “fundamental errors” in the way that the risks for each bid had been calculated, leading to the default surety required of bidders being too low. The government reimbursed the four bidders for all costs incurred; this amounted to £39.7 million, with a further £4.9 million paid to FirstGroup as reimbursement of their mobilisation costs. In the ensuing shambles, numerous incumbent franchise holders were directly awarded extensions to their franchises instead of opening them up to tender. So much for competition!
17 December 2014 – A report from the Public Accounts Committee is severely critical of the Department for Transport’s inept handling of the procurement of new trains for the Intercity Express Programme and Thameslink. The DfT had chosen to break away from previous procurement arrangements and carry out the procurement by itself, despite having no previous experience in this area.
3 April 2015 – The private train operator West Coast Railways has its operator’s licence suspended by Network Rail amid concerns over the company’s ability to perform its safety obligations. This action followed an incident on 7 March 2015, when a steam-hauled train operated by West Coast Railways passed a signal at ‘danger’ after the driver had switched off vital train protection systems, narrowly avoiding a collision with a passenger train running at 100 mph.
Is it anyone wonder we’re all shouting Bring Back British Rail?
Spread the word! Link to this post using www.bringbackbritishrail.org/timeline and read more compelling evidence for Public Ownership here: www.bringbackbritishrail.org/evidence
Towards Public Ownership
31st March 2015 | Evidence / News
This TUC Report summarises research by Transport for Quality of Life, to show the high costs of running rail franchise “competitions” – estimated at £45million for every single one!
Given that there are 11 of these unnecessary “competitions” scheduled to take place before the next parliament ends in 2020, the Report shows how much we could save by then if we chose to run these franchises under a single publicly-owned railway company instead. It’s more than £600million!
The Arguments for Public Ownership are Overwhelming
1st January 2015 | Evidence / News
There are so many reasons why privatised rail is failing us and the environment. Check out this brilliant leaflet, supported by Bring Back British Rail, which will be handed out at the nationwide Protests for Public Ownership on Monday 5 January 2015.
The Rail Privatisation Scam 🚊💸
Great piece in Tribune Magazine today 👇 ... See MoreSee Less
The Rail Privatisation Scam
tribunemag.co.uk
After taxpayers were scammed out of tens of millions of pounds, the train company responsible has just been rewarded with a lucrative new contract – definitive proof that the rail privatisation rack...Comment on Facebook
This is shocking. Even by the new threshold of what is OK…you know, illegal parties , non Dom’s tax cuts, P and O, PpE scam contracts, selling off public service broadcasting, ….
their all scamming the taxpayer its disgraceful
The sooner he better
De-privatise the railways now.
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Like GBR. Haha
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🥳 ScotRail re-nationalised! It becomes the 5th UK franchise now back in public hands 🚉 With proper investment from The Scottish Government, we have the chance now to bring down the cost of fares, and to expand and improve railway services across Scotland 🏴 ... See MoreSee Less
Comment on Facebook
Heavens help us The snp couldn't run a raffle, education failure, NHS failure, ferries laughing stock, Prestwick disaster, a bridge that can't be open in cold weather, the list is endless
As a railway employee (just) government ownership will do none of what's been said here. If anything it will make things worse. The people who know how to do things properly are tied by budgets and targets from their employer. Under government ownership they will always take the cheapest option that will look good on PR brochures but won't last.
This is how everything should be transported ,instead of by lorries that ruin the roads !
If we recall the lies 30 years ago from John Major and Transport Secretary John MacGregor that privatisation of British Rail will deliver improvements in services and lower fares.....!! Then the first laugh we had was the Stagecoach South West Trains fiasco. Everything wasn't moving so well after that.
Unfortunately, we don't currently have a Scottish Government willing to do that. Indeed, it's just sanctioned a huge fare rise and services are being drastically cut next month.
Proper investment - what does this mean? How much do you think is needed and where? What happens if the Government cannot afford to keep the standards up to expectations? Would they lose an Election over the issue?
This is bad news for Scotland, will go the same road as Prestwick Airport , Ferry’s , Education , Police Scotland….
Hoping they will now stock egg sandwiches on the buffet trolley
Now the nats will youse this for Free Rail Travel for under 25s to Bribe for more Votes
A giant disaster waiting to happen.! !
I bet Govia isn't renationalised, in spite of constant failures.
The trains in Wales have been in public ownership for about 5 years now.
Scot Rail was allready in public handsjust not the British public as Abello is part of the NS or Dutch state railways. As is Arriva of DB or the German railways.
Successive Labour governments haven’t done much.
What a pity Starmer won't commit to the same in England
They couldn't run a toy train set never mind a country's rail service. Destination disaster.
I started my career with BR and 30 years later hopefully will be back working under BR again soon.
Back under the tories who privatised it in the first place...I'm lost for words 🤔
It took a very long time to realise the privatisation scam...
A smokescreen, not real nationalisation
Shame they are running such old stock
Northen rail still a mess
A directly operated franchise is some way off public ownership, all the problems caused by the shambolic privatisation of BR will still exist !
This is a double edged sword. Bringing back the railways into public ownership is fine provided they stay in public ownership. What's actually happening here is that the govt is bailing out failed train franchise operators with taxpayers money. Once they're commercially viable I fear they'll be sold off again. Effectively we're privatising profit and nationalising losses at public expense.
RIP Scotrail. Everything the snp touches ends up a steaming pile of 💩
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Govia Ltd: the biggest rail corruption scandal since privatisation 🚆💸 As Grant Shapps looks set to award the disgraced company a new six-year contract, read what a terrible mistake this is in the Association of British Commuters' new blog 📰
Join our CrowdJustice campaign to #takebacktsgn here👇
crowdjustice.com/case/tsgn ... See MoreSee Less
Govia Ltd: the biggest rail corruption scandal since privatisation
abcommuters.com
According to press reports yesterday, the Department for Transport is preparing to award disgraced company Govia Ltd a new six-year contract for Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR). It follows the publi…Comment on Facebook
Shame on Grant Shapps for awarding a six-year contact to the disgraced private company #Govia which is *still under investigation* for financial malpractice 💸 Our legal team have despatched a letter to the Serious Fraud Office to demand they intervene 👇 www.bringbackbritishrail.org/tsgn/letter04_250322.pdf
This rancid Tory government associated with rampant corruption ? Surely not. Errrrr........
Be so much better if we just had one company that ran service in the south, South East & South West and same for North West, North & North East. Similar to Network SouthEast days.
So what is anyone going to do about it? Absolutely bugger all. Award contracts to your mates, cheat, lie ,fiddle expense accounts, claim for second dwellings and lie (again) yet they know that they are untouchable. Shamefully, there is no viable option as Labour are a joke and do not represent the working class any longer. Not since Tory Blair emerged as the new shining light, where; “Things Could Only Get Better!” Tosspot!
The whole privatisation of the railways was and is one huge fiddle. I cite the huge cost overruns of the Great Western Electrification, and HS 2? There should be a root and branch investigation by the fraud squad into industrial fraud on that one.
When is going to stop,mistake after mistake!Vote Tory,you'll pay the price,especially with that W in charge!!
And of course Public ownership never wastes money or has overruns etc etc etc
There’s more than Govia that are corrupt.
Oh, the politics of greed
Okay. What Tory has shares in this.
Corruption rewarded by the corrupt..
There'll be 'no evidence ' no doubt.
What did you expect when they named it Govia. Another Tory toad ...
Is it called "Govia" in honour of Michael Gove?
Shameful.
links not working
Is just Scotrail that's getting nationalised?
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Vermin.
Absolute 'kin disgrace
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🚆 The Department for Transport has fined #Govia £23.5m for financial malpractice whilst running Southeastern 💸
Yet it's still considering giving the same private company a new contract to run rail services on Thameslink, Southern & Great Northern? Enough is enough. It's time to #TakeBackTSGN
Support our campaign 👉 crowdjustice.com/case/tsgn ... See MoreSee Less
Govia Rail fined £23m over undeclared taxpayer funding
www.bbc.co.uk
The train operator says it "accepts" the fine after failing to return over £25m in taxpayer funding.Comment on Facebook
One wonders what a TOC would have to do to become unfit to run a franchise. Previously, DoT were of the views that if a firm had its franchise removed it had to surrender all the others. The firms get around this of course with their independent shell companies - but the parent companies are the ones driving the bus.
At one time these things would illicit a shrug and a resigned sigh that nothing can be done. These things are now a daily occurrence across the politic landscape and I sense a palpable sense of anger boiling over, that finally enough is enough, as evidenced by the comments beneath this post.
Fined them, then let them carry on as usual. Ffs
Are we getting close to the revolution yet? Give it a bit longer, once the cost of living overtakes worker’s static wages.
It’s bit like “the Apprentice”….no candidates you’d trust to buy you a sandwich, but one of them has to win.
……..and when it’s some poor bugger claiming a bit too much benefit they don’t call it ‘undeclared taxpayer funding’ do they?
Fraud on this scale should result in prison sentences. It never does.
Thatcher's government sold the skeleton of a our country. The very things that support it in the world & people still think she was great? It's beyond me!
An office in Newcastle, owned by private investors with company bases in Singapore amongst other countries. Good old fashioned Tory values. What could possibly go wrong?
This contract was terminated in September 2021 and Southeastern is now run by the department of transport, you're a bit late with the news.
And that fine is paid from...taxpayer funding... How ironic.
Please tell me govia is not Owned by Michael gove
23.5 million fine for stealing 25 million? What a bloody joke!
Fucking corruption in plain sight they just don't give a monkeys about us
Must be run by that idiot Gove! 🙄
Another nose in the trough.
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With Britain's privatised rail services we are paying #moreforless 🚉💸
Please sign the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT)'s petition against cuts and fare hikes across our railways 👇👇 ... See MoreSee Less
Rail passengers shouldn't be paying more, for less.
www.megaphone.org.uk
Sign our petition to demand fair fares and a properly funded railway that protects rail services, staffing and the climate.Comment on Facebook
Yeah, don't bring BR back. Don't let the government have more control than they already have. Reform the railway into 6 companies - London and North Eastern, London and North Western, Greater Western, Southern, Scottish and Railfreight. Set a minimum quality standard. Encourage these companies to do transit-oriented development. Smaller companies could be formed to run small, self contained networks like Mersey Rail or LTS.
I'm like most people, am more worried about gas and electricity prices going up 60% than the possible price hikes on the trains which are consistently around 5%, don't distract stupid politicians into thinking this will help people the most, there's already a plan in motion to invest billions in the network, and much has been run by the government.
We're constantly told how incompetent the government are yet people want them to run the railway. Hmmm
Fares going up, services and staffing being cut .... snafu
Why the fares keep rising while the quality of rail travel gets worst ?
Their shareholders and need their dividends and their directors need their huge bonuses.
Why does everyone want BR back? No government has funded the railways properly since the 50s, who did Beeching and Marples work for? All I ever saw with BR was cuts in services, train lengths, lines closed, closures of works, purposeful loss of traffic, freight, parcels, papers etc, track layouts rationalised, capacity reduced, staff levels reduced. Poor trains that still blight the network. Reduced track maintenance and drainage work. The government departments cut every year. Can't really see putting it back in to government control is a good idea. Will watch Scotrail closely as cuts are already in the pipe line and it's not yet been taken over.
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Let me know just how many thousands of jobs may go and I might sign. Oh and also let me know how many £millions are provided by the Government to fund Network Rail. Also how many billions they are likely to pay out to fund the bankrupt 'Bulb' Electricity suppliers' inews.co.uk/inews-lifestyle/money/bulb-energy-collapse-cost...
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