McNulty Report

[313103]

Out of interest, would you re-introduce guards on the London Underground?

I would, but then that is my opinion. I would like to see the statistics of fatalities and accidents on the underground, that can be directly attributed to OPO.

 

[sprinterguy]

Pacers are at least better than having the line closed.

Undoubtedly, but the problem is that Pacers see use on far more services than the rural ones that were under threat in the eighties (Granted that a lot of Pacers were purchased with PTE support, so were always intended for other duties), and the UKs’ railways are not under the same austerity conditions they were then to warrant a new generation Pacer equivalent.

 

[spacehopper]

Out of interest, would you re-introduce guards on the London Underground?

Once somethings gone it ain't coming back!

Thats the same justification the McNut job report makes- x% of trains already DOO, no guards on LUL. So might as well get rid of the rest of them because obviously if something supposedly works somewhere then it will work everywhere.

 

[WatcherZero]

As has been pointed out before DOO doesnt mean no second member of staff, it can just mean a conductor with fewer duties and responsibilties being paid between 1/3 and 1/2 as much as a guard, i.e. 13-18k instead of 26k.

 

[Zoe]

I think the future is ATO, the driver and guard jobs can then be combined with the train driving itself but a member of staff available to drive at slow speeds in case of an emergency.

 

[spacehopper]

As has been pointed out before DOO doesnt mean no second member of staff, it can just mean a conductor with fewer duties and responsibilties being paid between 1/3 and 1/2 as much as a guard, i.e. 13-18k instead of 26k.

Difference in pay isn't all that great. It can be about £3000. I'm not on £26K in fact I'm closer to a Strathclyde TE wage wise. The guards on higher wages will no doubt be the ones at SWT that work a longer week or so called "Train Managers" that have additional scope over things like catering because those sandwiches often riot.

In the 8 years I've been a guard I'm still taking home almost the same as when I first started. I started on about £19,700 and 8 years later I'm on £21,900. So no whopping pay increase in fact I don't earn all that much more than my friend on a £13,000 year salary. Difference in our monthly pay is often just a £100.

You aren't a conductor if you don't have a guards rule book. So trains should be staffed but with people with little or no training and on a much lower salary? Ahh the great race to the bottom. What about next rail review.... Well we got rid of skilled staff on the trains brought in low cost unskilled labour but we are still paying wages for this "second member of staff" aboard trains. But I thought we didn't need these "second member of staff" trains are DOO after all. Well lets get rid of this "second member of staff" trains are no longer DOO but OPO- I thought thats what they already were?

Just think of the savings and lower fares.......

 

[Metroland]

McNulty report detail 2

Summary of points from report

Revenue

Train operating costs have increased by £1.7bn, £0.8bn of which can be attributed to the increase to the increase in train-km, most of the rest is staff costs. Rolling stock charges increased by £0.3bn reflecting the increase in train km. NR costs now largely the same as Hatfield. Infrastructure enhancement expenditure increased by £1bn, mainly because of large projects like Thameslink.

Since 1996/97, although rail passenger-km have increased by 59%, there has been little improvement in the cost per passenger-km.

Leadership

Leadership is defined as “How the behaviours and actions of the [industry] create the culture, values and overall direction required for long-term success.”

Problems:

- great uncertainty over who leads the industry
- the vacuum left by this lack of industry leadership has often been filled with civil service or political leadership. Government intervention in the day-to-day business of running the railway is at an unprecedented level.

Recommendations for cost reduction

The Study recommends that a Rail Delivery Group is established with responsibility for high-level cross-industry leadership supported in certain areas by a Rail Systems Agency.

As long as Government is providing significant amounts of subsidy, Government is bound to be involved in the industry’s affairs. The role of Government is discussed in Section 5 of this report. In summary, Government should:

• specify how much money it is prepared to provide (SoFA) and what outputs it expects in return (HLOS), including cost objectives; and • provide clear policy direction and high-level objectives for the industry, and should control financial outcomes against the SoFA/HLOS.

However, Government should not be involved in as much detailed specification as at present – a level of detailed involvement which it has been suggested is significantly greater than when the industry was run by the nationalised British Rail.
Planning

There needs to be less focus on capital and infrastructure solutions. Instead there needs to be a renewed focus on making better use of existing capacity, ensuring that a full range of solutions is considered at an early stage. A more whole-system approach needs to be taken to planning, whereby the whole-industry costs, revenues and benefits are fully considered.

Duplication in the planning process needs to be reduced or removed so that the industry is working together on one set of plans with cross-industry and Government buy-in.

Structures and interfaces

What is crucial in this respect, however, is not so much the number of entities as the fact that, at the interfaces where efficiency requires that different parties work closely together, this is not happening for many reasons, not least the structure of NR, ineffective or misaligned incentives, or the silo mentality of industry players.

The TOCs are commercial companies with normal responsibilities to their shareholders. Their behaviours are also conditioned by the fact that franchises have often been for a maximum of seven years and, inevitably, the operators are very conscious of how many years are left on those franchises. As a result of all these factors, TOCs understandably, and not infrequently, take positions that seek to exploit contractual positions to the maximum, or which reflect a very short-term view, when the real interests of the railway would be better served by a longer-term view or a more co-operative approach.

The Study considers that there is a strong case for having some independent ownership of Route IM concessions. Independent ownership would increase the effectiveness of comparative regulation by allowing Route IMs to be truly independent, with a sharper profit motive increasing the incentive to improve efficiency and new management giving the potential to accelerate innovation. It could also improve the interface with TOCs as, being independent, the infrastructure manage could be able to respond to local needs more effectively.

It is recognised that independent ownership of Route IMs could create additional interface issues. It is therefore important that independent ownership is considered only in reasonably self-contained parts of the network.

The Study sees the structural options analysed earlier as offering considerable potential to facilitate cost savings. The DfT and ORR, in consultation with industry, should ensure:
- that NR moves towards a fully-devolved and decentralised structure, based on 12 route-based units, as quickly as practicable and certainly in time to be the basis for CP5 regulation;
- that NR aims to put in place one independently-operated Route IM concession by 2014/15;
- that much closer alignment between NR and TOCs is secured through: − cost and revenue sharing as a minimum for all franchises and routes as quickly as is practicable; − joint ventures or alliances, with the aim of having at least two of these in place by 2013/14; and − vertical integration, with at least one vertically-integrated pilot in place for the beginning of CP5 in 2014/15;
- that existing regulatory protections for freight and other users of the network are retained and, where necessary, strengthened to reflect the new interfaces emerging as a result of industry restructuring.

Based on the analysis undertaken by LEK, the Study estimates net incremental cost savings of £100m–300m per year by 2018/19 from:

- independent ownership of one Route IM;
- a trial of vertical integration; and/or
- cost and revenue sharing and joint ventures or alliances in other areas of the network.

The Study considers that independent ownership of some Route IM concessions would provide a significant benefit to efficiency from the ability to compare performance across a number of different companies and the ability of local management to make local decisions, responding to local conditions and creating innovation. In the case of vertical integration there would be strong alignment between train operations and infrastructure.

 

[Minilad]

All this talk about DOO again.....

Interesting to note that the examples they give about DOO include obviously Strathclyde TE services and SET HS- OBM services. Yeah they are DOO but have a "second member of staff" aboard.

So wheres the savings..... ???

If your going DOO then what are you saving from still having that "second member of staff" aboard? If your going to have a "second member of staff" aboard then why not have that staff as someone who is a highly trained skilled professional? You could call them a "guard". Difference in a guards wages and a TE few thousand. I think that few thousand is money well spent on having someone who yes can do revenue but is also safety critical.

We really that obsessed with the few extra seconds of having to close and open the local door and check that the train is on the platform? Letter in RailNews from an SWT driver pointing out any saving in driver doing doors would be eroded by waiting at junctions etc. I manage to check and sell tickets and do the doors without delaying the train. Soon be upstairs if the delay minutes started to rack up. I must say fitting stock with intermediate DKS is such a huge help in regards to time keeping, revenue protection and patrolling. I'm stepping on to the platform at each stop, so people on the station can come up to me and ask questions, I can see who is boarding and how many much easier from a revenue protection point of view. See bikes and buggies make sure they get on the train at the right section. Help buggies and wheelchairs on. I'm sure me doing these things saves those precious seconds.

Obviously all the cliches about feet up in back cab come out- despite being banned by some TOCs and none of the stock i sign can be worked from the cab. The whole train has a very good view of me doing the doors at every stop, checking tickets, doing announcements how much more visible can I be.

I'm the face of the company, no station staff, no booking offices- I can be the only interaction thousands of passengers have. If someone is sat in a cab at the front of the train that's a great position to be in if people need help or assistance, timetable or connections, help with a case. I believe me being a guard on the train is making a big difference to not only the passengers safety but the whole journey experience. Service quality, safety, security, cleanliness all plummet if trains become DOO. I'm sure FCC had 11% NPS rating on availability of on board staff (explained by DOO). Most passengers you talk too appreciate having a guard on the train. If most of the posters on this forum don't then fair do. Different experience traveling on a DOO network to a line that has a guard.

Loss of revenue through DOO and open stations over the years must have been huge. The revenue I bring in for the company pays my wages many times over. Going to close booking offices, install TVM (get broken into, break down, don't sell cheapest tickets), make trains DOO, then revenue is certainly going to take a hit.

So what kind of railway do we want (cheaper) but at what true cost. The cost that can't be justified by a %. So unless this mythical "second member of staff" is chopped and only person on the train is a driver who has taken a pay cut and is paid same as a van driver (because you can obviously compare like for like) and who works 12 hours with a 15 minute break drives 700 miles because rail staff are so unproductive and Spanish practices are long gone and he isn't in a bloody union that strikes at the drop off a hat because railway unions are always on strike. TVM replaces a booking office, guard, RPI. Vending machine replaces a chef, customer host, buffet staff. CCTV camera and help point replaces station staff, gateline, BTP. The railway will require little subsidy, shareholder dividends will be huge, everybody buys a ticket with their super smart card. The railway will be the cheapest in europe but what railway will we really be left with?

Show McNulty this immediately. I am sure he would come up with figures proving this that and the other but the above passage is spot on.

 

[Metroland]

The bottom line for any business (or should be) is whether their employees add value to the company. This may not be direct value, but say a reassurance for passengers or sale of food which may indirectly add value as passengers will travel that may not - such as the practice of loss leaders like cheap alcohol in supermarkets, or 1p Air fares.

I tend to agree any system, which may save cost at one level, but increase costs more at another is a bad thing.

However, I suspect McNulty sees the role of additional onboard staff as purely a customer service one (and revenue protection), whereas the safety issues looked after by more technology. Likewise, in the age of mobile phones and the internet, the case for ticket offices is diminished.

Understandably the unions will object to this, but the railway is not a bubble and is affected by the availability of money, current working practices, and what passengers want and can afford.

 

[All Line Rover]

However, I suspect McNulty sees the role of additional onboard staff as purely a customer service one (and revenue protection), whereas the safety issues looked after by more technology. Likewise, in the age of mobile phones and the internet, the case for ticket offices is diminished.

I still see the need for ticket offices, as you can't do everything on a mobile phone or the internet. Some examples are:

• Not everyone has the internet, so book Advance tickets at the ticket office.
• Things such as excess fares cannot be issued online, and at a station can only be issued from the ticket office.
• Refunds cannot be processed at a ticket machine - they can only be done at the ticket office.
• When a ticket machine breaks down, the response is always: "Go to the ticket office!"
• Finally, not everyone likes to purchase their ticket at a machine, and prefer to do so at a ticket office with some human interaction, particularly as the staff can give onward travel advice. Why else is the ticket office at Waterloo always so busy even though the station has a plethora of ticket machine?

 

[Zoe]

There's no reason why new ticket machines could not be introduced that would be able to issue advance fares.

 

[All Line Rover]

There's no reason why new ticket machines could not be introduced that would be able to issue advance fares.

That's a good point, and I've always wondered why they haven't bothered to do it yet, but many of the points I've mentioned above will never be able to happen at a ticket machine.

 

[Minilad]

I would like to see ticket machines that issue PRIV tickets. Not found one yet

 

[CarterUSM]

Spacehopper,

A very well thoughtful and interesting argument to those who think DOO is the best thing since sliced bread. I couldn't have put it as elequent as you have.

Agreed! I couldn't have said it as eloquently either! Nice one spacehopper.

 

[90019]

I have a simple question about DOO.
Why not create a new role, that is saftey critical and has the same duties as a guard except the doors?

 

[notadriver]

I have a simple question about DOO.
Why not create a new role, that is saftey critical and has the same duties as a guard except the doors?

Its already done that way on the Javelin trains but not safety critical. Its probably the future. Their salary is 26k.

 

[yorksrob]

As private firms aim to increase profits, it is argued by some stakeholders that this drains the rail industry of investment as dividends are paid to shareholders rather than being reinvested into the industry. Therefore, this argument suggests that the subsidies paid for the service are higher than necessary to cover its costs to allow companies to make a profit. However, this argument assumes that the cost of services would be the same if they were provided by a public- or private-sector company. Private companies should be incentivised to reduce costs to create a profit and it seems likely that the Government would need to pay the same, if not more, for these services due to inefficiency in a nationalised industry. This appears to be supported by the Study’s international benchmarking of TOC costs and evidence from other sectors.

Furthermore, the scale of TOC and Rolling Stock Company (ROSCO) profits is relatively small in relation to the overall costs of the industry. In 2009/10 combined profits of TOCs and ROSCOs were around £400m, which was around 3% of total industry expenditure.

(Aimed at McNulty not Metroland)

3% seems to be a significant proportion of expenditure compared to when:
1) the nationalised railway didn't take any profit but used it to cross-subsidise loss making parts of the network and
2) the railway still generates a loss as a whole.

It's misleading (deliberately I suspect) to talk simply in terms of profits being removed from the network. There are also significant administrative costs in having over 100 different companies where once there was one.

The fact that McNulty is prepared to look at cutting staff at the front line of services where passengers actually need them but shies away from this money-go-round shows him to be a bit of a clueless wonder IMO.

-even with one national organisation there is likely to be a need to develop disaggregated business units within this structure for management to be effective,

Well duh.. why do you think all of your stats are compiled in terms of London & South East, Inter-City and Regional railways in the first place Sir Roy ?

 

[Zoe]

It's misleading (deliberately I suspect) to talk simply in terms of profits being removed from the network. There are also significant administrative costs in having over 100 different companies where once there was one.

It can never go back to the monolithic system used by BR. Due to an EU directive operations and infrastructure have to be separate. They could both be owned by the government but accounting would still have to be separate. As much as I don't like it, the old BR is gone forever unless there is a large shift in politics.

 

[Ferret]

So, when we have no ticket offices, and all trains are DOO, precisely who will be providing assistance to the disabled who wish to board our services? Or does the DDA not apply if it means McNumpty can save a few pounds by booting staff? Oh for half an hour with this man......

 

[ukrob]

As has been pointed out before DOO doesnt mean no second member of staff, it can just mean a conductor with fewer duties and responsibilties being paid between 1/3 and 1/2 as much as a guard, i.e. 13-18k instead of 26k.

Difference in pay isn't all that great. It can be about £3000.

Multiply that £3000 by a thousand guards over ten years - it isn't a small difference at all

 

[WatcherZero]

It's misleading (deliberately I suspect) to talk simply in terms of profits being removed from the network. There are also significant administrative costs in having over 100 different companies where once there was one.

Did not BR already have seperate accounting units for the different parts of the company and operate an internal market?
I have seen published Thesis on its internal personnel market circa 1985.

 

[Zoe]

Did not BR already have seperate accounting units for the different parts of the company and operate an internal market?
I have seen published Thesis on its internal personnel market circa 1985.

Two years before privatization BR went through the Organizing for Qaulity initiative. This gave the sectors of BR ownership of the infrastructure in addition to the operation of trains. The structure in use for the few years before then though with the sectors running the trains and the regions owning the infastructure would have worked well.

 

[Smudger105e]

Two years before privatization BR went through the Organizing for Quality initiative. This gave the sectors of BR ownership of the infrastructure in addition to the operation of trains. The structure in use for the few years before then though with the sectors running the trains and the regions owning the infastructure would have worked well.

Rumour has it that name was chosen by a disgruntled senior manager whose departure from BR was imminent.

O for Q

Say it quick!

 

[Mintona]

Its already done that way on the Javelin trains but not safety critical. Its probably the future. Their salary is 26k.

27k now

 

[BestWestern]

So, when we have no ticket offices, and all trains are DOO, precisely who will be providing assistance to the disabled who wish to board our services? Or does the DDA not apply if it means McNumpty can save a few pounds by booting staff? Oh for half an hour with this man......

This is a very valid point, and one which needs examining. I've often thought the same. As I understand it, the DDA essentially requires that, eventually, anybody in a wheelchair can arrive at a station and use a train service in exactly the same way that an able-bodied customer would, including being provided with whatever assistance is reasonably needed. So yes, how exactly will this happen?

The obvious answer would be for the Driver to do it, but I think it extremely unlikely that Drivers will be comfortable with the idea of leaving the cab to do this whenever required. Whilst the burden of DOO etc may be imposed upon them regardless of what they may or may not think, you can bet your bottom dollar they will argue hard as hell that they are Drivers not customer service staff, if the railway starts trying it's luck with that sort of stunt.

Any implementation of DOO is unlikely to be immediate, regardless of what the report may suggest. It can't just be imposed overnight, as there simply isn't the infrastructure in place to enable this. The current widespread ex-BR generation of suburban multiple units aren't currently set up for it, and even those which have their original DOO kit still in place (some of FGW's recently acquired 150/1's still have live door release buttons on the desk) would need significant modification to bring it up to acceptable, workable, modern day standards. This means taking trains out of service to develop and install upgraded equipment, which most TOC's won't be happy doing. It also means spending yet more money on increasingly ageing trains. You would then need to fit banks of monitors to each and every station platform for Drivers to observe the train doors, along with their associated camera systems. Plus a wide range of other issues, such as re-engineering the multitude of various platform or trackside equipment at certain locations such as TRS plungers etc which Guards operate or are involved in operating, and so on.

All of this would cost an enormous sum of money, on top of the even larger sum payable to the thousands of affected Guards who would face redundancy, and who would then cost the state a fortune by turning up en masse at their local Job Centres. Once the new system of operation came in, there would be an immediate and dramatic fall in revenue, due to the obvious mentality of many passengers that there is longer any 'need' to purchase a ticket. No matter how high the penalty fare might be, under DOO there will always be a high percentage who take the chance and don't pay. All in all, this would leave the railway with a huge outlay followed by significantly reduced income with which to recoup those losses, all in the name of efficiency. I think that's known as a 'False Economy'!

 

[YorkshireBear]

So, when we have no ticket offices, and all trains are DOO, precisely who will be providing assistance to the disabled who wish to board our services? Or does the DDA not apply if it means McNumpty can save a few pounds by booting staff? Oh for half an hour with this man......

I completely agree, so that leads me to ask what happens on current DOO routes?

 

[WatcherZero]

Technically the staff only have to be there when boarding ramps are required, if the station has level boarding the passenger is expected to manage by themselves or with the help of a travelling companion.

 

[Ferret]

Best Western - I find it very unlikely that drivers will do it. And if they do, they'll want a pay rise I'm sure!

Jimmy Owl - I presume station staff do the necessary duties as and when. I just find this to be yet another example of how ill-thought out this report actually is.

 

[WestCoast]

I completely agree, so that leads me to ask what happens on current DOO routes?

The National Rail website outlines where you can and can't get assistance - in a similar way to "step-free" tube access map.

On the subject of DOO - I agree with sentiments above about a safety critical role which doesn't involve the doors.

Someone above mentioned that DOO couldn't be done on rural routes. Well, I've seen it done in mainland Europe (a certain Arriva owned firm actually) where the driver literally leaned out of the window to close the doors! Now I don't want that to happen in the UK, but it can be done!

 

[Ferret]

Technically the staff only have to be there when boarding ramps are required, if the station has level boarding the passenger is expected to manage by themselves or with the help of a travelling companion.

But if those staff aren't there any more...?