Rail Industry Recovery Group

[JonathanH]

3) services in area services of maximum track capacity utilisation,

Plus cancelling all capacity enhancements across the network other than electrification work. I know that it is capital rather than revenue spending but it might just save enough to keep the costs down of losing revenue whilst the work would have been ongoing.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Plus cancelling all capacity enhancements across the network other than electrification work.

Thats already happened for last two years with Rail National Enhancements Pipeline not been updated for two years.

 

[JonathanH]

Thats already happened for last two years with Rail National Enhancements Pipeline not been updated for two years.

Have the teams working on outline plans for hoped for improvements been reallocated to other projects though?

 

[Class 170101]

For Avanti, I'd expect a thinned out peak service (e.g..no "Pullmans" in the morning, and no xx33/57 departures in the evening)

Though Liverpool might object to losing its xx33 service (Half Hourly - broadly with those services)

 

[JonathanH]

Though Liverpool might object to losing its xx33 service (Half Hourly - broadly with those services)

The best way to object would be to fill the remaining service every night. If that doesn't happen there can't really be objections to losing the xx33 departure.

Having said that, cutting xx57 trains doesn't seem consistent with other views expressed today that the Euston to Glasgow service should be sped up by taking steps out of the xx30 Euston departure.

 

[Watershed]

Yes it is going to be a hard sell, but if the current level of service and cost is financially unsustainable, and reduced, then it is either redundancies and the current unsustainable Sunday lotto continuing or everyone taking a haircut.

Precisely. Unfortunately not everyone seems to realise how serious the situation is.

I suppose there is the alternative of redundancies and an increase in the average working week of the remaining staff to take Sundays inside, but this sounds quite expensive? I understand where you are coming from, but I can't see the unit hourly cost of staff being increased that much.

In most places that would only be possible by reverting to a 5 day working week, which would mean a lot of changes (and generally the unions are in favour of fewer, if longer, working days). I think it's more realistic simply to put Sundays in the working week as things are.

Obviously rest day patterns will have to change but it's perfectly doable, it essentially means you nominally need a bigger depot complement. But if there are fewer diagrams (often peak time extras lead to the most inefficient diagrams, many of which can now be eliminated) then this balances itself out.

 

[Class 170101]

The best way to object would be to fill the remaining service every night. If that doesn't happen there can't really be objections to losing the xx33 departure.

The only observation I would make, not directly related but a principle, local bus service got busier in the daytime as it ran later into the evening so people used it as they could get home rather than cars or taxis. So for Liverpool how about 22:00 (extend the Crewe service) or 23:00 from London?

 

[RT4038]

Precisely. Unfortunately not everyone seems to realise how serious the situation is.


In most places that would only be possible by reverting to a 5 day working week, which would mean a lot of changes (and generally the unions are in favour of fewer, if longer, working days). I think it's more realistic simply to put Sundays in the working week as things are.

Obviously rest day patterns will have to change but it's perfectly doable, it essentially means you nominally need a bigger depot complement. But if there are fewer diagrams (often peak time extras lead to the most inefficient diagrams, many of which can now be eliminated) then this balances itself out.

Of course it wouldn't be beyond the bounds of possibility for depots to have 2 different rosters - one for the 4 day working people and one for the 5 day working people, both with Sundays inside the week. Those happy with flat week go on the flat week roster and those wanting a guaranteed higher paid week go on that roster. This sort of thing happens frequently in the bus industry.

 

[43066]

The Night Tube Drivers are being integrated as regular drivers now, so will be on same T&Cs. When Night Tube did run, regular Train Operators could not cover Night Tube turns of duty or vice-versa - work was kept completely separate.



Would you believe, that there has been a change from the 'Draft' document, which read:


To, in the 'Final' version:


So it looks like someone has realised.

So essentially the penny has dropped that some variation of Sundays outside/committed Sundays is likely to be cheaper than Sundays inside. What’s the betting that some variation of the status quo will continue!?

 

[Watershed]

What seems to be missed here is that for regional TOCs, rather than the London ones, passenger numbers never really dropped to the levels seen in and around London. Our services are vefting busier by the day and some are at pre-pandemic levels.

A service cut just to save money wouldn't work, as the cuts aren't needed here. So that doesn't magically save your day a week to make Sunday a part of it with the same number of crew.

Even if they are busy, they are unlikely to be paying their way unless they are 'standing room only' (and even then, only on lines with high p/mile fares). So as far as the DfT is concerned I think it may still be 'fair game' to cut back there.

1) peak services into the big cities, principally London. These trigger particularly high marginal operational costs (trains that might operate 2 services a day). The difficulty will be picking which services go. There is no doubt that the main suburban line into Waterloo will not need 18tph in future, but which 2-4 trains get removed?

Most of these have already been eliminated to be fair. But as you say they're very unlikely to return, regardless of what happens.

2) ‘competing’ services on the same route, often introduced as ORCATS raids. TPE north of Edinburgh being a good example. You might like to suggest your own candidates. My bugbear is the occasional SWR services to Bristol, or the GWR services to Brighton. Both cause a lot of extra cost for negligible benefit.

Didn't realise they ran north of Edinburgh

The ECML inherently lends itself to ORCATS raids under the current structure, but even under a unified 'banner' it doesn't seem unreasonable to want 2tph from Newcastle to each of London, Birmingham and Manchester (ideally clockface, obviously in practice it won't be).

In terms of withdrawing TPE north of Newcastle though, there will be little to no resultant saving for as long as the units are maintained at Craigentinny.

A more cost effective way of providing that may be to have some services splitting and joining at York, albeit that has its own foibles, and simply wouldn't work at the moment!

If there's any services ripe for removal on the grounds of duplication, it would surely be ECTL's, which will solely exist to compete with LNER and the airlines.

3) services in area services of maximum track capacity utilisation, where removing one or two services will have a disproportionately good effect on performance. Castlefield corridor is obvious, Birmingham - Wolves and the Cross City similarly, and countless places in the Home Counties.

The difficulty here is that you often end up with an unbalanced service if you remove a few to improve performance. E.g. the CrossCity is currently an ungainly 10-20-10-20 pattern because 2 out of a clockface 6tph have been removed. So a recast is needed to take full advantage of the benefits whilst providing an acceptable timetable.

 

[Bald Rick]

you need to lose complete diagrams to save the resourcing costs

You don’t. Diagrams can be redrawn, and regularly are, and will be.

Have the teams working on outline plans for hoped for improvements been reallocated to other projects though?

Some have, some haven’t. Some will leave, I expect.

Precisely. Unfortunately not everyone seems to realise how serious the situation is.

It is desperately serious. Certainly the most serious in my 30 years.

Most of these have already been eliminated to be fair. But as you say they're very unlikely to return, regardless of what happens.

Only temporarily removed to date.

Didn't realise they ran north of Edinburgh

Oops. I’m glad you know whatI meant!

In terms of withdrawing TPE north of Newcastle though, there will be little to no resultant saving for as long as the units are maintained at Craigentinny.

Oh there is. Huge saving in crew and units.

The difficulty here is that you often end up with an unbalanced service if you remove a few to improve performance. E.g. the CrossCity is currently an ungainly 10-20-10-20 pattern because 2 out of a clockface 6tph have been removed. So a recast is needed to take full advantage of the benefits whilst providing an acceptable timetable.

Recast QED.

 

[yorksrob]

Even if they are busy, they are unlikely to be paying their way unless they are 'standing room only' (and even then, only on lines with high p/mile fares). So as far as the DfT is concerned I think it may still be 'fair game' to cut back there.

This is precisely the outlook that needs to be resisted, politically if need be.

The justifications for running these services prior to Covid are still there, and many routes already have hourly or worse services which aren't suitable for cuts.

 

[Mojo]

Where Sunday is currently outside of the working week for train crew, bringing it inside would result in increased staffing requirements. So if they're looking to reduce staffing numbers, I guess they could do so by bringing Sunday in but not increasing establishment numbers, meaning redundancy wouldn't be required.

I agree with you on that, it does seem a bit of a contradiction to suggest that Sundays should be brought inside the working week but also to reduce costs. For the TUs the overtime is also a good bargaining chip as it gives the members a good upper hand in any disputes whilst avoids the members losing pay as they would in a strike. Perhaps one thought would be around moving more rest days into midweek and spreading the overtime burden across the week rather than having it primarily consolidated on Sundays. I’m not a driver and Sundays are part of my working week, but I’m regularly offered overtime on weekends and always turn it down, but am more than happy to pick up early turns on weekdays.

Starting with the basic premise of equal pay. Which Driver is worth more ? The one that drives multiple traction and multiple routes or one that drives at 100mph ? I'll initially acept the idea of a banding system but you then have to work out a heirachy. Am I worth more as a Metro Driver who carries thousands of passengers a day than a branchline Driver who carries far fewer but may carry out an essential service ?

Perhaps that is the point - that the different jobs are equal and one type of driving is no better / demanding / worthy of extra pay etc than the other. I always think of the police in that there are lots of different jobs of equal importance but usually always paid the same, the “reward” being the different types of work (e.g. neighbourhood police don’t usually do nights, response enjoys the variety of work and the driving around, firearms don’t get involved in petty arrests and crimes, yet all 3 get paid the same).

 

[Robertj21a]

Of course it wouldn't be beyond the bounds of possibility for depots to have 2 different rosters - one for the 4 day working people and one for the 5 day working people, both with Sundays inside the week. Those happy with flat week go on the flat week roster and those wanting a guaranteed higher paid week go on that roster. This sort of thing happens frequently in the bus industry.

Careful, it's that sort of sensible, flexible, solution that will upset the RMT (and many rail staff too)

 

[43066]

Careful, it's that sort of sensible, flexible, solution that will upset the RMT (and many rail staff too)

Except that it isn’t. That’s basically the arrangement we have at my depot (separate links for Sundays inside/outside).

 

[RT4038]

So essentially the penny has dropped that some variation of Sundays outside/committed Sundays is likely to be cheaper than Sundays inside. What’s the betting that some variation of the status quo will continue!?

I wouldn't make that assumption at all. I expect the wording has been changed so as not to rule out any particular solution which does not involve voluntary working to maintain the service.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Jun 2021 ==

This is precisely the outlook that needs to be resisted, politically if need be.

The justifications for running these services prior to Covid are still there, and many routes already have hourly or worse services which aren't suitable for cuts.

I would expect a spread of cuts virtually everywhere, but they are more likely to fall on those routes of poor patronage for the existing number of trains, rather than on strict financial criteria.

 

[43066]

Perhaps that is the point - that the different jobs are equal and one type of driving is no better / demanding / worthy of extra pay etc than the other. I always think of the police in that there are lots of different jobs of equal importance but usually always paid the same, the “reward” being the different types of work (e.g. neighbourhood police don’t usually do nights, response enjoys the variety of work and the driving around, firearms don’t get involved in petty arrests and crimes, yet all 3 get paid the same).

The difference in pay for the driving grade is usually a result of historical factors: different terms have been sold, agreements reached etc. over the years, and of course a competitive employment market exists for qualified drivers.

I suspect this state of affairs is likely to remain under GBR: TOCs, open access operators and freight will continue to require drivers. It sounds as though recruitment will remain the responsibility of TOCs.

I wouldn't make that assumption at all. I expect the wording has been changed so as not to rule out any particular solution which does not involve voluntary working to maintain the service.

They’ve specifically removed the reference to the removal of voluntary working. That implies it could be retained if it is sufficiently robust and proves cheaper.

I suspect committed Sundays (a la Thameslink) is the ideal solution for those TOCs who retain Sundays outside.

 

[big_rig]

The problem with your second para is that it does very little to cut costs. I fear that rail staff could easily be faced with changes in T&Cs without compensation (including detrimental pension changes), changes in contracts, job losses or all of those. Exactly what has been happening in the public sector since 2010. I suspect that they will find little support to fight either. A Govt with a big majority picking a fight when conditions are optimal for it... Think Thatcher and the NUM.....

This and your other posts pick up on that old and interesting point - while I imagine lots of rail staff (myself included) are broadly in favour of a 'nationalised' system (whatever hue of it one prefers) to what we have now, the Government is not a particularly nice employer compared to the quasi-private ones we have now.. I wouldn't want to take a bet on when we see pay rises again on the railways. I imagine the '20 & '21 freezes will be extended another year or two then there'd be a 1% with no backdating in '23 perhaps? Who knows.

 

[Wolfie]

This and your other posts pick up on that old and interesting point - while I imagine lots of rail staff (myself included) are broadly in favour of a 'nationalised' system (whatever hue of it one prefers) to what we have now, the Government is not a particularly nice employer compared to the quasi-private ones we have now.. I wouldn't want to take a bet on when we see pay rises again on the railways. I imagine the '20 & '21 freezes will be extended another year or two then there'd be a 1% with no backdating in '23 perhaps? Who knows.

TY for a considered and thoughtful response. I might add that competition between TOCs for staff may also have bumped up rail industry wages. That would be lost in a nationalised system.

I don't want to depress you but as a Civil Servant since 2010 l faced pay freezes for over half of the years, have never had more than a 1% rise, and some of what l did get additionally was paid as one-off non-consolidated payments.

 

[43066]

TY for a considered and thoughtful response. I might add that competition between TOCs for staff may also have bumped up rail industry wages. That would be lost in a nationalised system.

Quite agree with this. It’s a mystery to me why many railstaff and unions seem to want a return to full nationalisation! It’s down to rose tinted spectacles, I suspect.

 

[Watershed]

Oh there is. Huge saving in crew and units.

I wouldn't call a saving of one unit and, at most, 12 crew diagrams huge. Especially given there will still be exactly the same number of drivers.

 

[ComUtoR]

Of course it wouldn't be beyond the bounds of possibility for depots to have 2 different rosters - one for the 4 day working people and one for the 5 day working people, both with Sundays inside the week. Those happy with flat week go on the flat week roster and those wanting a guaranteed higher paid week go on that roster. This sort of thing happens frequently in the bus industry.

This sort of thing already happens in the rail industryy too.

Careful, it's that sort of sensible, flexible, solution that will upset the RMT (and many rail staff too)

As above, it already happens so not an issue.

Perhaps that is the point - that the different jobs are equal and one type of driving is no better / demanding / worthy of extra pay etc than the other. I always think of the police in that there are lots of different jobs of equal importance but usually always paid the same, the “reward” being the different types of work (e.g. neighbourhood police don’t usually do nights, response enjoys the variety of work and the driving around, firearms don’t get involved in petty arrests and crimes, yet all 3 get paid the same).

I was discussing this with my Son yesterday. My T&Cs have Sundays inside but my Sister TOC has Sundays outside. They get more but also have a longer day and any Sunday is an additional day. I much prefer a 4 day week so for my the uplift in pay doesn't interest me because my focus is more on conditions and work/life balance. If it was a case of all being equal do all the conditions become a point of division or just an acceptance that each role simply has a different set of requirements. An interesting discussion for another thread. However, as my point was raised due to a comment about National banding then it sitll becomes a case of splitting people based on how much you value them or deem them to be worth. I know a few people in the NHS so I understand the banding system. It is also something that does exist in some form at my TOC too. Just last night a collegue was discussing his move from Grade 2 to Grade 4

 

[Bald Rick]

I wouldn't call a saving of one unit and, at most, 12 crew diagrams huge. Especially given there will still be exactly the same number of drivers.

That’s a few million quid. Big saving for the relatively minimal effect on passengers.

 

[ainsworth74]

Quite agree with this. It’s a mystery to me why many railstaff and unions seem to want a return to full nationalisation! It’s down to rose tinted spectacles, I suspect.

I'm not sure about rail staff but for the unions and especially everyone's favourite bête noire, the RMT, I think it's purely ideological. Someone earlier mentioned that (and I'm paraphrasing a bit) they thought it was that the RMT were hankering back to the 'glory days' of being able to call for national strike action again but I really do think it's pure ideology (with that perhaps being seen a nice to have extra at most). Just read a few RMT press releases (no liability accepted if you end up clawing your eyes out) and the language being employed sounds far more like an outfit which holds views which are contrary to its members interest but because it's fits in with an ideology it's pursued anyway.

Let's be honest, for the majority of RMT members privatisation has been fantastic. Wages have grown significantly and usually above inflation. Job security for most roles is very good. T&Cs compared to the wider private or public sector are generous. There's an excellent pension scheme. For instance does anyone think that if BR had still been a thing circa 2010/11 that staff would have been able to enjoy above inflation pay agreements whilst the rest of the public sector was frozen or getting, at best, 1%? Heck, BR likely would have been cutting services around the time of the recession like they had had to do during previous recessions when money got tight. And that might have had implications for jobs. In reality there was no particular worry about job losses, not much worry about service cuts and pay was not subject to much, if any, restraint at all. I can recall plenty of arguments on here around that time about strike action (or at least threatened strike action) over pay offers not being good enough despite being far above what anyone in the wider private or public sector were getting at the same time! Brutal reality is that privatisation has been fantastic for most railway staff.

Of course it hasn't all be perfect. LO conductors were made redundant five or six years ago when that network went fully DOO. Southern conductors have had their terms changed and are now OBS. Some jobs which should rightly be done in-house have been outsourced (catering, some ticket checking, etc). Etc etc. But looking at the piece as a whole? Seems pretty sweet to me.

The only reason as a union which is supposed to be acting in its members interests to want to advocate a return to a system which would likely see them in a worse position overall is one based purely on ideology rather than a pragmatic view of what is actually best for our members.

 

[Watershed]

That’s a few million quid. Big saving for the relatively minimal effect on passengers.

It's only a saving if it was previously overtime (it mostly wasn't) or you make drivers redundant (not happening). And having fewer units in service saves effectively nothing under the Hitachi agreements.

Meanwhile, passengers on XC and LNER services will experience journey time increases leading to lost productivity and wasted time quite possibly in the millions a year, due to having to stop at Reston...

 

[Bald Rick]

It's only a saving if it was previously overtime (it mostly wasn't) or you make drivers redundant (not happening). And having fewer units in service saves effectively nothing under the Hitachi agreements

Not all TPE units are Hitachi of course. And drivers don’t have to be made redundant to save money on drivers.

 

[Ianno87]

Meanwhile, passengers on XC and LNER services will experience journey time increases leading to lost productivity and wasted time quite possibly in the millions a year, due to having to stop at Reston...

Eating into a few turnround times at Edinburgh by 6-8 minutes probably costs less than an entire hourly service all day every day.

 

[Watershed]

Not all TPE units are Hitachi of course.

If what you're alluding to is that having fewer units in service allows a cascade, potentially allowing some units to come off lease, I fear that's wishful thinking.

Eating into a few turnround times at Edinburgh by 6-8 minutes probably costs less than an entire hourly service all day every day.

But if it's not an additional service then suddenly it makes a lot more sense. Reston is a white elephant IMHO, but as it's going to happen, it should at least be given a fighting chance of proving its value by having a decent service. 4 trains a day isn't going to cut the mustard.

 

[Starmill]

If what you're alluding to is that having fewer units in service allows a cascade, potentially allowing some units to come off lease, I fear that's wishful thinking.

Why? TPE have nowhere near enough work for their current 'full fleet' as it is.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Meanwhile, passengers on XC and LNER services will experience journey time increases leading to lost productivity and wasted time quite possibly in the millions a year, due to having to stop at Reston...

Reston is ScotRails problem and was supposed to be served by a Edinburgh-Berwick Upon Tweed service presumably an extension of the Dunbar service I recollect. As you rightly say for XC/LNER to serve it is daft beyond belief as they would also end up having to stop some at Dunbar as well to provide connectivity.

Mind you this is an example of how fixing problem has a wider knock on impact and reeks of the fiasco that was created around Manchester with the Ordsall chord.