Did anyone watch First Sight: A network under scrutiny (Feb 1991) on BBC Parliament yesterday?
I remember things were pretty bad, but it really did show what a mess things were. The blame was on insufficient investment and not anticipating the growing demand, as well as no accountability or even a way to get any money back if your train was late or cancelled.
I am unclear as to how or why anyone would think that bringing it back under Government control would do anything but make investment another major issue.
I didn't realise that NSE only got 10% subsidy, with Intercity getting 0%. Would that change? If not, the customers would still be expected to fund everything, so wouldn't be likely to see a sudden cut in fares.
And how funny that it started and ended with talk of bad weather (snow) bringing the network to a halt! Oh, and talked about Crossrail and Thameslink as imminent!!
A somewhat far fetched, and dare I say it, melodramatic interpretation of history.
Anyone can take a route at the end of it's investment cycle and see the problems. They could have given more airtime to Kent Link, which had just been started, or the lines out of Liverpool Street which had got new trains a little earlier, but quite understandably such things don't really constitute news. What the programme showed to me was that once the Government finally coughed up some investment, NSE knew exactly what to do and how to deliver it.
Had privatisation not have happenned would the sky have fallen in and the railway ground to a halt ?
More realistic would have been either of the following two scenario's:
- Gmnt continues its investment and NSE progressively moves on to its other route modernisations.
- Gmnt takes takes longer to cough up and some things, such as slammer replacement take longer - which as it happens is just what happenned under privatisation.
No accountability - that was addressed by John Major's passengers charter under British Rail (I still have the original version as it happens) so privatisation would have made little difference to that.
As for things grinding to a halt during the snow, it just goes to show some things don't change whoever runs the trains.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Yes, with many having been heavily delayed. But they've happened without us having BR back.
I am not sure why it would change if we renationalised, or that it would be any better. In fact, I got the impression that NSE was in such a mess and everyone admitted how far behind it was, plus the massive sums of money needed to upgrade, it would have made getting private investment seem too good an opportunity to pass up.
With trains from the 1950s and signalling from the 1920s, all Governments should take some of the blame for possibly making privatisation a necessity, and why it's just as likely Tony Blair would have done so (or very similar) had the Tories not rushed it through.
I don't really see your point. You suggest that a sell off was a necessity, yet not only have the current round of improvements been massively delayed, but they are largely Government funded anyway.
As for trains from the fifties (which would have been getting on for around forty years old at the time of withrawal), here's a news flash. We had forty year old trains in the South and in Leeds in the early noughties. We will have forty year old HST's and PEP units in a few years time. We will also have forty year old sprinters in a few years after that. I'd start getting used to the idea if I were you.
From what I can see, to have a cheaper service the only real option is to increase taxpayer subsidies. Then you can cut fares and see rail as a public service... but not even renationalising the railway would do that.
That has always, and only ever will be a political decision beyond the remit of railway management, whoever that may be.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Ofcourse. Plus you have to take BR statistics with a pinch of salt, does the subsidy figure rely on £0 rail access charge, for instance.
If you don't pay a track access charge, why would you take account of it in the first place. Wouldn't it make more sense to count rail renewal as a one off capital expenditure rather than a revenue cost anyway ?
.