Great Western (and other TOCs) - nationalisation

[KNN]

Sorry but that shouldn't be necessary.

Whether it should or shouldn't, it would be

Only in your opinion.

Agreements exist between the company and the trade union. The company can't just change what pleases them. (And you.)

Indeed. I've been trying to avoid directly bringing up unions. But they are one of several reasons why, GBR or not, XC couldn't change overnight.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 29 Sep 2025 ==

Part of me wonders how much of this is down to poor management and how much of it is down to inadequate infrastructure who's upgrade has been a political and treasury football for the past 15 years!!!

It tells you the answer to that in the chart further down, it's c.67% NR, c.11% other TOCs, and c.22% Avanti.

 

[Horizon22]

As for Heidi Alexander saying things will improve, that's not going to be very hard from such a low start point.

In most recent 4 week period
3.31% of GWR trains cancelled overall
8.54% cancelled in 1 of its 12 areas
Lowly 61.59% on time (more than 1 in 3 late)
227 trains shortformed below DfT min contract spec

https://www.gwr.com/-/media/gwr-sc-...performance/GWR-Periodic-Web-Report-P2605.pdf

Whilst GWR's performance is not great, there are some caveats to this:

a) On Time as a metric is within 1 minute at every stop. With GWR being an intercity and regional operator (mostly), many passengers wouldn't really mind or even notice, being 5 minutes or so late. However that train would fail an OT metric at every location.
b) The delay attribution here is not mentioned - I would not be surprised if much of this delay is attributed to infrastructure performance by Network Rail. Of course under GBR these two entities will be together, but you can't hardly run trains to time and as booked if there are continual issues in this area.

 

[zwk500]

Whilst GWR's performance is not great, there are some caveats to this:

a) On Time as a metric is within 1 minute at every stop. With GWR being an intercity and regional operator (mostly), many passengers wouldn't really mind or even notice, being 5 minutes or so late. However that train would fail an OT metric at every location.

You notice a 5 minute delay if your connection goes from being 7 minutes to 2 minutes.

b) The delay attribution here is not mentioned - I would not be surprised if much of this delay is attributed to infrastructure performance by Network Rail. Of course under GBR these two entities will be together, but you can't hardly run trains to time and as booked if there are continual issues in this area.

This is a good point.

 

[Wilts Wanderer]

It tells you the answer to that in the chart further down, it's c.67% NR, c.11% other TOCs, and c.22% Avanti.

That doesn’t necessarily give an accurate picture. Consider this; a points failure might close a route for a few hours; a well structured and managed TOC with adequate contingency resources might get the job moving again within another hour or two, and restore the full timetable by the evening. The same failure but impacting a poorly managed, shoe-string TOC operation with stock and crew diagrams over-optimised for ‘efficiency’ might see severe disruption continue for the remainder of the day and knock-ons possibly spilling overnight into the following day or beyond, thereby producing a far more severe impact on delay minutes and cancellations, and disrupted passenger journeys. In both cases, NR would be responsible for the whole lot (as it’s root-caused by their infrastructure failing) but the overall percentages are far worse with the second TOC than the first.

(A real-world example on the WCML would be the impact of Avanti traincrew resource structure meaning that everything gets cancelled north of Preston as soon as an infrastructure failure occurs anywhere between there and Glasgow/Edinburgh, rather than keeping the job moving as far as (say) Carlisle if the route is open.)

 

[Dr Hoo]

(A real-world example on the WCML would be the impact of Avanti traincrew resource structure meaning that everything gets cancelled north of Preston as soon as an infrastructure failure occurs anywhere between there and Glasgow/Edinburgh, rather than keeping the job moving as far as (say) Carlisle if the route is open.)

But unless GBR promises to make an ongoing commitment to more spare crews, more spare rolling stock, more diversionary route knowledge and bi-modes what can practically change?

 

[Annetts key]

I don't hold out much confidence sadly, having seen Steve White of SE agree to extra access for engineers in the daytime to patrol the railway on a section of line during the summer school holidays which as it happened was during one of the summer heatwaves when people may have wanted to head to the coast.

NR have also put in a late notice block at Gidea Park

Emergency Engineering Work on Sunday 28th September

www.greateranglia.co.uk

I wonder how long that speed restriction has been in situ and whether we will see more of this behaviour to ensure the engineers get their own way?

Yes and as that same article said,


I'm sorry but whilst Network Code hasn't suddenly been thrown in the bin, in practise NR offer few if any options beyond the options they wish to pursue.

So when would you suggest urgent maintenance and repair work is carried out?

Specificity, hot weather inspection has to be carried out when it's hot. It's no good doing this at night when everything is cooler!

Rails, fixings, sleepers, signalling and point equipment that is discovered to be defective has to be replaced, repaired, adjusted etc.

NR are well aware of the disruption that closing a line causes.

In most of the NR offices that I have been in, there are screens showing the current state of the network performance. And every Network Rail office computer has a link to these details as well.

Senior Managers regularly review their sections performance and that part of the network that they are responsible for. In the event of a major train delaying fault, special telephone, video or in person conferences are convened to decide on the best course of action. TOCs and FOCs have input to these.

Yes, part of the problem is that the maintenance budget and the available resources for maintenance work was reduced to save money. You can blame the last government for that.

So back to you, what is your suggestion?

Sorry but that shouldn't be necessary.

Class 377 / 379 / 387 run with just a driver in 12 carriage formations
(321/322/360/365 before them as well)

Why not a pair of Voyagers with Driver and Guard?

Not everywhere.

Only in your opinion.

Agreements exist between the company and the trade union. The company can't just change what pleases them. (And you.)

It's been much discussed before but you mustn't have (chosen to ?) read those posts.

As pointed out in this post (quoted above) there are agreements that exist and/or a lack of infrastructure. For example, a 387 is not permitted to run in passenger service as a driver only operated service between Reading and Cardiff.

British Rail was not 'Deeply inefficient' as John Major famously declared it.

However it didn't make a lot of money for lawyers, bankers and accountants!

As for world class, you might be surprised to hear that BR was highly regarded in many countries - witness the success of Transmark (BR's international consultancy arm). [Disclaimer - I worked for them for a few years]

In many areas the privatised railway did make parts of BR look efficient. Some politicians tell lies. Major being one of them. That government did what they did for idealogical reasons.

This is not going to end well. If and until the pay and T&Cs are harmonised, it is pointless and is nothing more than smoke and ideological mirrors. Compare LNER staff travel arrangements with SWT for example and then it is plain to see that the haves (old DfT control LNER) are so much better off than the have nots (very new DfT control SWT) and this is OK is it ASLEF? No didn't think so but what is being done about it?

The complete mess of thousands of different sets of T&Cs and rates of pay that is a result of the privatised railways is a nightmare for both the management and the unions. I suspect both would like to sit down and come up with something better. I don't know if it will ever get back to a handful of sets of T&Cs that BR had by the end of the 1970s.

But yes it will take time, as it involves negotiations and money will be tight. So change will be slow.

It is the objective of the RMT to have a nationwide staff travel scheme. That should be something that is fairly easy once GBR has control of all the former TOCs. Back when BR existed, the Inland Revenue lost a court case over taxing staff travel facilities. They lost because the court decided that BR would run the timetabled services regardless if any staff were using these services. Therefore it cost BR no significant amount of money to provide staff travel facilities. I would therefore make the case that the same would apply to GBR. Agreeing to give the staff travel facilities should be an easy and cheap win for both GBR, the unions and the staff.

 

[Hairyspotter]

Sorry but that shouldn't be necessary.

Class 377 / 379 / 387 run with just a driver in 12 carriage formations
(321/322/360/365 before them as well)

Why not a pair of Voyagers with Driver and Guard?

Because the passenger call for aid system on a Voyager does NOT sound in the driving cab, and whilst I can't speak for those other classes, that means a double Voyager set must have a competent person in each portion to both answer the call for aid , assist as necessary and reset the system via a T key. I imagine that failure to ensure this falls foul of PRM requirements which is why when there isn't two guards provided the second unit has to be locked out. And no, it shouldn't be wired through to the driving cab. The alarm sounding every few minutes because some parent allowed little Johnny to press the big red button by the wheelchair space is an added distraction that drivers don't need.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 29 Sep 2025 ==

We already knew about that from the earlier ‘nationalisations’ though. Your question has been asked before, and there was no clear answer to whether a GBR branded TOC could go the other way subsequently.

I’m quite looking forwarded to DFT getting XC staff to work normally at weekends for instance.

How do you propose to make this happen? If people don't want to work on their rostered days off and there aren't enough people or enough trained people to cover the work, nothing will change.

Do show your working out.

 

[Tester]

In many areas the privatised railway did make parts of BR look efficient. Some politicians tell lies. Major being one of them. That government did what they did for idealogical reasons.

If we had known at the time what John Major was getting up to with one of his ministers, Britain's railways might have been saved!

 

[swt_passenger]

How do you propose to make this happen? If people don't want to work on their rostered days off and there aren't enough people or enough trained people to cover the work, nothing will change.

Do show your working out.

You missed the sarcasm presumably. But I agree, the way things are, there‘s little any government can do about it.

 

[officewalla]

So when would you suggest urgent maintenance and repair work is carried out?

Specificity, hot weather inspection has to be carried out when it's hot. It's no good doing this at night when everything is cooler!

Rails, fixings, sleepers, signalling and point equipment that is discovered to be defective has to be replaced, repaired, adjusted etc.

NR are well aware of the disruption that closing a line causes.

In most of the NR offices that I have been in, there are screens showing the current state of the network performance. And every Network Rail office computer has a link to these details as well.

Senior Managers regularly review their sections performance and that part of the network that they are responsible for. In the event of a major train delaying fault, special telephone, video or in person conferences are convened to decide on the best course of action. TOCs and FOCs have input to these.

Yes, part of the problem is that the maintenance budget and the available resources for maintenance work was reduced to save money. You can blame the last government for that.

So back to you, what is your suggestion?


Not everywhere.


As pointed out in this post (quoted above) there are agreements that exist and/or a lack of infrastructure. For example, a 387 is not permitted to run in passenger service as a driver only operated service between Reading and Cardiff.

In many areas the privatised railway did make parts of BR look efficient. Some politicians tell lies. Major being one of them. That government did what they did for idealogical reasons.

The complete mess of thousands of different sets of T&Cs and rates of pay that is a result of the privatised railways is a nightmare for both the management and the unions. I suspect both would like to sit down and come up with something better. I don't know if it will ever get back to a handful of sets of T&Cs that BR had by the end of the 1970s.

But yes it will take time, as it involves negotiations and money will be tight. So change will be slow.

It is the objective of the RMT to have a nationwide staff travel scheme. That should be something that is fairly easy once GBR has control of all the former TOCs. Back when BR existed, the Inland Revenue lost a court case over taxing staff travel facilities. They lost because the court decided that BR would run the timetabled services regardless if any staff were using these services. Therefore it cost BR no significant amount of money to provide staff travel facilities. I would therefore make the case that the same would apply to GBR. Agreeing to give the staff travel facilities should be an easy and cheap win for both GBR, the unions and the staff.

My point at this moment in time is that LNER have fantastic staff travel arrangements and SWT do not (not even sure if they kept what they had but someone will know). Both are now run by the DfT and long before taking over, details such as this should have been sorted. My co-operation and goodwill for anything other than my corer work is going to be sorely tested if my company staff travel arrangements are removed once the DfT gets its grubby mits on us. Something as basic as this should remain untouched as it is a nil cost advantage. I travel it costs nothing extra. It costs then I am less likely to travel so nil financial gain. We don't need to wait for GBR to actually stand up to maintain current arrangements. National agreements will of course take longer.

 

[Class 170101]

So when would you suggest urgent maintenance and repair work is carried out?

Well you do have Section 4 maintenance access and its not fully utilized.

Specificity, hot weather inspection has to be carried out when it's hot. It's no good doing this at night when everything is cooler!

Rails, fixings, sleepers, signalling and point equipment that is discovered to be defective has to be replaced, repaired, adjusted etc.

NR are well aware of the disruption that closing a line causes.

But do they care? I get the distinct impression at times that they don't.

In most of the NR offices that I have been in, there are screens showing the current state of the network performance. And every Network Rail office computer has a link to these details as well.

Senior Managers regularly review their sections performance and that part of the network that they are responsible for. In the event of a major train delaying fault, special telephone, video or in person conferences are convened to decide on the best course of action. TOCs and FOCs have input to these.

Yes, part of the problem is that the maintenance budget and the available resources for maintenance work was reduced to save money. You can blame the last government for that.

So back to you, what is your suggestion?

How about giving notice when a defect first arises rather than NR sitting on it until the replacement part arrives and then pressurizing operators to agree to short notice access?

The more notice the public gets the better.

 

[aron2smith]

It tells you the answer to that in the chart further down, it's c.67% NR, c.11% other TOCs, and c.22% Avanti.

All that says to me is that one group should be running the lot in an integrated manner. Fragmentation of the railway and a lack of a long term strategic plan is what's wrong. If government thinks its too expensive to nationalise the ROSCOs, it should create its own ROSCO company instead which does the orders and slowly pushes the rest to bankruptcy. Plenty of new trains are needed all over the network, so is a good time to do it. Point is, it needs to be run as one system asap.

 

[saismee]

My point at this moment in time is that LNER have fantastic staff travel arrangements and SWT do not (not even sure if they kept what they had but someone will know). Both are now run by the DfT and long before taking over, details such as this should have been sorted. My co-operation and goodwill for anything other than my corer work is going to be sorely tested if my company staff travel arrangements are removed once the DfT gets its grubby mits on us. Something as basic as this should remain untouched as it is a nil cost advantage. I travel it costs nothing extra. It costs then I am less likely to travel so nil financial gain. We don't need to wait for GBR to actually stand up to maintain current arrangements. National agreements will of course take longer.

GA staff will be keeping all current travel arrangements with Transport UK TOCs, as well as c2c. I think travel benefits will be untouched for other TOCs when they become nationalised.

 

[dk1]

GA staff will be keeping all current travel arrangements with Transport UK TOCs, as well as c2c. I think travel benefits will be untouched for other TOCs when they become nationalised.

Oh that’s good to know. I assumed it was just going to be GA/C2C routes.

 

[Wilts Wanderer]

But unless GBR promises to make an ongoing commitment to more spare crews, more spare rolling stock, more diversionary route knowledge and bi-modes what can practically change?

True, but at least all parties (combined into GBR) will be collectively responsible for delay minutes and poor performance. So - in theory - a silo-mentality policy to cut back on traincrew provision could maybe be challenged by the operating/route control side who would previously have been in a different organisation and completely disconnected from that decision?

In essence, a major benefit of GBR could/should be to eliminate instances currently where one party can knowingly plan in a manner that exacerbates poor performance in the cheerful knowledge that it will be recorded as someone else’s problem/fault.

 

[GordonT]

If we had known at the time what John Major was getting up to with one of his ministers, Britain's railways might have been saved!

Also if he had dug his heels in regarding his initial preference for recreating the pre-1948 Big Four regional private rail companies the job of putting Humpty Dumpty together again might have been a bit easier.

 

[Wilts Wanderer]

If we had known at the time what John Major was getting up to with one of his ministers, Britain's railways might have been saved!

Technically they weren’t both in government at the time - she was a backbencher and he was in the government whip’s office. They ended it when they were both promoted to government - ALEGEDLY

 

[Tester]

Also if he had dug his heels in regarding his initial preference for recreating the pre-1948 Big Four regional private rail companies the job of putting Humpty Dumpty together again might have been a bit easier.

I understand that Cabinet minutes, released under the 30 year rule, showed that the prime requirement for the method of privatisation to be used was that it must render reinstatement as difficult as possible. So big four would be clearly unacceptable!

 

[CyrusWuff]

GA staff will be keeping all current travel arrangements with Transport UK TOCs, as well as c2c. I think travel benefits will be untouched for other TOCs when they become nationalised.

Sadly I don't share your optimism for staff at Chiltern, who currently get free travel on Arriva Rail London, CrossCountry and Grand Central services.

 

[david1212]

To happen in 2026, alongside GTR, Chiltern and West Midlands - Facebook post this morning from Rail Minister Heidi Alexander:

At Labour Party Conference, I’m announcing the 4 train operating companies to be brought into public ownership next year: Great Western, GTR (including Thameslink and Southern), Chiltern and West Midlands.

This will mean that by the middle of next year over half of all railway journeys will be done on publicly operated railways.

We are returning the railways to the service of passengers, putting an end to the delays, cancellations and waste that have frustrated the travelling public for too long.

My dad was an electrical apprentice on our railway in Swindon, making sure things worked properly.

It seems fitting that 60 years later, I will also be rewiring the railways as we rebuild a transport system fit for the future.

It will take time, but we will sweep away decades of fragmentation and pointless bureaucracy, and deliver a Great British Railway people can be proud of and rely on.

Indeed, happy birthday to the railways. And Northern celebrated the day with cancellations & short formed services, leading to trains rammed to the gills, punters left on platforms, and I imagine a lot of Delay Repay claims.

Hmmmmmmmmm ........ this does not fit with the statement I have highlighted.
I will leave those who use Northern to comment about their current experience compared to when operated by Arriva but it falls a long way short of being anywhere close to few never mind no delays and cancellations.
( For anyone reading who does not know Northern is owned by DfT Operator for the Department for Transport (DfT), after the previous operator Arriva Rail North had its franchise terminated at the end of February 2020. )

 

[LowLevel]

Oh that’s good to know. I assumed it was just going to be GA/C2C routes.

EMR have confirmed it on staff social media this morning, no change.

 

[185]

Post nationalisation travel facilities have been inconsistent.

DFTO Northern got a variety of operators including GC & Merseyrail.

DFTO Transpennine got... err... a pass for their own trains. And maybe residential travel on Northern.

 

[The Planner]

Well you do have Section 4 maintenance access and its not fully utilized.

Does that allow for the jobs that need doing once you factor in the amount of working time actually possible after getting isolations, plant on track, staff briefed etc? We are at the point where some section 4 and 5s are effectively useless due to what time is actually usable as TOC/FOCs ask for 5 or 10 minutes off them to run trains. It slowly erodes over time.

But do they care? I get the distinct impression at times that they don't.

Again, dispute process is there.

How about giving notice when a defect first arises rather than NR sitting on it until the replacement part arrives and then pressurizing operators to agree to short notice access?

Depends in how long a block is needed and whether operators agree to it. If a TSR is on due to it, then the operators know.

The more notice the public gets the better.

Vast majoirty of people would take no notice if they were told more than 3 months out unless it was a substantial blockade.

 

[Mikey C]

If the generic TOC brands are to keep going for a while, will their own marketing programmes continue, as surely that's something which should be merged?

For example last night within half an hour on TV I saw adverts for LNER, GWR and Avanti. All completely different, yet really just advertising "inter-city" rail travel, rather than anything especially unique to them.

 

[KNN]

If the generic TOC brands are to keep going for a while, will their own marketing programmes continue, as surely that's something which should be merged?

For example last night within half an hour on TV I saw adverts for LNER, GWR and Avanti. All completely different, yet really just advertising "inter-city" rail travel, rather than anything especially unique to them.

Seems like it will carry on like this "for a while", given LNER are already in the fold.

There should be some good cross-TOC ideas, Club Avanti, for example, would be a popular one to expand to a wider range of services.

 

[dk1]

EMR have confirmed it on staff social media this morning, no change.

Excellent news. Thank you.

 

[greaterwest]

Post nationalisation travel facilities have been inconsistent.

DFTO Northern got a variety of operators including GC & Merseyrail.

DFTO Transpennine got... err... a pass for their own trains. And maybe residential travel on Northern.

DFTO SWR got only a pass for their own trains, aside from the standard 75% PRIV discount on other operators. Previously they had a certain amount of free leisure travel on Hull Trains, Lumo, GWR and Avanti West Coast.

 

[185]

Think the two unions want to be pushing DFTO to ensure this egregious attack on our hard earned terms & conditions is reversed.

*don't worry, I deffo pulled a Mick Lynch face as I typed that

 

[Recessio]

And surely many of the leading lights running the newly privatised TOCs on a day to day basis were retained in similar positions that they occupied within BR? And the TOCs where ex-BR managers had less influence tended to be the ones more prone to cock-ups? I write merely as an armchair observer and reader of 'Modern Railways' - others who were actually in the fray may be able to confirm or deny.

By the same token, it'll be interesting to see how many senior staff from current franchise holders stay with the railway into GBR.

I know some on privatisation some of the franchises were management buyout (Chiltern I believe?) , but I don't know if there were other cases and if that did lead to better performance or not.

 

[PLY2AYS]

I know some on privatisation some of the franchises were management buyout (Chiltern I believe?) , but I don't know if there were other cases and if that did lead to better performance or not.

I’m fairly certain the Adrian Shooter iteration of management are all gone now sadly.