Wonderfully offensive article in the Torygraph

[scotsman]

Here we have Harry Mount, a priveleged public school boy, latin lover, and arrogant snob, giving his opinion on the woefully inadequate train service between Liverpool Street and Ipswich. Unfortunately his article is about as biased as North Korean media referring to George Bush's opinion of Kim Jong-il.

Forget the bad weather; blame the fools, liars, layabouts and thugs who work on our railways

I have just got back from a return journey to Ipswich that should have taken an hour each way from Liverpool Street. Instead, it took three hours to get there, and three and a half to get back, because of the snow.

Of course I understand that bad weather makes things tricky – though it really wasn’t that cold, or snowy, in East Anglia. But what is unforgiveable is the attitude of those who work on the trains. Their incompetence adds hours on to the journey. Their rudeness, aggression, laziness and ignorance add an infuriating psychological layer to the experience.

At least in a car, you only have your own demons to fight with – a delayed train journey means dependence on, and intense anger with, a series of unhelpful, unpleasant, positively obstructive human beings. Better to take things into your own hands on the roads, however dangerous and congested they might be.

My horrors began at Witham, barely half an hour out of London. Without any warning, the train just stood at the station for an hour. One passenger discovered that the driver had simply just got off, taking the conductor with him. Not a single announcement was made. The passenger had only discovered the news from a teenager in an orange jumpsuit - who was, in a desultory way, tapping away thimblefuls of snow, building up where the edge of the train met the platform.

“Dunno what’s happening,” he said in an expression-free voice, “There’s no driver. There’s no conductor.”

Walking along the platform, I found the information desk – where five National Express East Anglia employees were snugly tucked into a nice, heated room, while dozens of confused passengers froze outside on the platform. All five of them should have been outside telling us what was going on. Instead, one of them occasionally popped out and stood on the threshold, just to repeat, “There’s no driver. There’s no conductor. All the trains at the station aren’t moving.”

The tone was downbeat, passive-aggressive – “I’m doing the bare minimum I can do here; don’t ask anything else – I’ll just repeat myself,” was the subtext.

As he was saying this, a contradictory announcement came over the intercom that the train would leave in three minutes, leaving startled passengers on the platform not knowing who to believe – the intercom or the thuggish man at the information desk. When a passenger asked him what to do, he said, “Get on this train. You’re lucky that any of them are leaving at all.”

That was the message throughout the day – “You’re lucky. Don’t bother us. Be grateful for what you’re getting. And don’t dare ask us to do anything on your behalf.”

And so it went on. When we finally got to Ipswich Station, two hours later, the wicked PA announcer was cracking up with laughter as he announced more delays to more trains – and more misery to more passengers.

On the way back, normal service was resumed. Our train broke down 50 yards outside Colchester Station – oh, that we could have got out and walked. But, no, we were trapped for an hour and a half, sent into deepening, never-ending circles of gloom, by a series of defensive announcements.

“An emergency locomotive is coming to take us into Colchester Station, where this train will terminate. I cannot tell you when it will arrive.”

Half an hour later – “The locomotive is on its way in approximately 20 minutes.”

20 minutes later – nothing. Falsely raised hopes collapse all round.

Half an hour later – “The driver is trying to connect the emergency locomotive but the tubes [What tubes?] are frozen.”

Another 20 minutes later, we limped into Colchester Station. There we were herded onto a different, smaller, stationary train, for another half an hour, with no announcements – until, suddenly, an aggressive voice came over the PA – “The London train will now be leaving from platform two.”

Cue desperate rush through an underpass onto another packed train – there a commuter told me that she’d seen the driver trying to warm up those tubes with a hairdryer. It summed up the amateurish, unprepared approach to an utterly predictable burst of cold weather – which has now been in place over Britain for almost a week.

Of course cold snaps will hit Britain again – and all this will happen again, too. You can spend all the money you want on snowploughs, better trains and more powerful hairdryers. But chaos will always reign when the railway is run by lazy thugs who see bad weather as an excuse to work even less hard than usual, rather than a reason to make more effort on behalf of the people who pay their wages.

I have fired off an email explaining my disgust in his article and suggesting he should perhaps do some voluntary work at a heritage railway before he writes something like that again.

 

[Clip]

Reading that he seems like thousands of other people who have had a moan about the F-ups to their train services and apparent unhelpfulness of the staff he encountered.

Why does who he is or where he has gone to school have anything to do with it? Your the one who has the problem with that.

What about all the non-public school educated people who have also ranted on the news and so forth? Do you not speak about them because they didnt go to private school?

 

[scotsman]

It was more to emphasise the point that he's lived a very sheltered life and he's getting disproportionately angry when things don't go his way. Almost like a spoiled brat.

 

[Clip]

It was more to emphasise the point that he's lived a very sheltered life and he's getting disproportionately angry when things don't go his way. Almost like a spoiled brat.

Yeh and ? you just dont like that. Many times when ive been at work i have been shouted at screamed at and even spat at and had a bit of a fight with people from lowlife skag heads to people who really should know better.

All the same to me - angry cos their trains are messed up and in some instances staff who could not care less as he outlined.

Now whilst this is only his side of the story ive been at Liv st many a time during disruption and staff are nowhere to be seen when your on the platform side of the barrier and you have to hunt them down just to find out what the hell is going on.

 

[Ibex]

What exactly does he expect staff to do? The staff at an Information Desk in a station who he claims run the railway, do far from that! Information staff are merely messengers. If he's been told there are no trains moving, then what more does he want staff to do? Make up when the next one will be?

The fact that train crew are unavailable is not their fault. Perhaps the driver on his train ended their shift at Witham, and the relief crew had been displaced. That's not the Info desk's fault now is it, and it hardly makes them thugs for having no info.

The ignorance of some people amazes me, but what more do you expect, afterall front line staff are just someone to moan at. Having just worked a full week of early shifts in absolutely awful conditions and having physically smashed solid compacted ice away from train doors in -12o, only to be told by a gormless passenger "Put some muscle into it" disgusts me. I'm sure everyone on here who works on the railway has done more than their fair share this week to ensure these clowns can have a service.

 

[Clip]

yep your right everyone has.. but peoples perception of this is that not enough is being done.. And picking on him because he may come from a well off background is not on.

Only my opinion

 

[ANorthernGuard]

yep your right everyone has.. but peoples perception of this is that not enough is being done.. And picking on him because he may come from a well off background is not on.

Only my opinion

I'm sorry Clip whether he comes from a well to do background or not, he comes across as a right arrogant toff with no perception of the real world.

 

[CosherB]

He has some valid points, and some of the responses on here don't seem to understand what customer service is about. The customer has paid for a service. If it can't be delivered, the railway should expain why, and what is being done about it.

The customer is NOT interested in the problems of the service provider. They just wan't what they paid for. That's called customer service.

For a crew to walk away from a train when there is no crew there to releive them, and the passengers to be told nothing but left to stew, is absolutely unforgivable.

Can you imageine going into a restaurant, the waiter takes your order and your money, then goes off shift. For some reason his replacement hasn't turned up. You are just left sitting there, with NO explanation as to where your food is, or when it might come. And no-one in the restaurant seems able to tell you or to do anything about it.


That is exactly the same as the situation the writer describes! It seems that despite privatisation, some workers on the railway still seem to think the system is there to serve them, not to provide a service for passengers.

Passengers don't expect everything to be 100% perfect any more than restaurant customers do; things fail, on railways and in kitchens (but staff should never walkm out leaving customers . But if things go wrong, they do expect the staff to do everything they can to sort it out, and most importantly - to keep them informed of what is happening!

 

[Skimble19]

He come's across like too many people from public schools do, arrogant and stuck up their own ar*e.. which is a shame, because those odd few that slip through the net get labelled as such, because of idiots like him..

 

[Clip]

I'm sorry Clip whether he comes from a well to do background or not, he comes across as a right arrogant toff with no perception of the real world.

See again - your having a go at him because he is a 'Tory Toff'. Do you not think that if everyone had access to write newspaper columns they would and would roughly be the same?

now im not sure if you have been to liverpool st of late. Especially on the suburban side. You go through the barriers and all the RPIs and dispatchers hang about in one area until the train has to leave and there is a little office there they can sit in. As soon as something goes wrong(in my experience of doing it every day for about 4 years) they disappear into this office and do not want to come out and help people who have gone through the barriers.

this is what he is getting at. Why are they not being proactive and being out there and visible helping people who may have questions for them? I normally have me headphones in so never normally hear the announcements so i want someone there to ask.

he is saying they were not there to ask but sat in their office. If i knew any of my staff were doing this i would be mightily dissapointed in them because i want them out there telling people what is going on. i want to show my railway in a good light and be proud that, yes people may be annoyed at the disruption, but if we can be seen to be visible and helping people this takes the edge off everyone's grumpiness.


you cant win them all round, but if you get the majority on yoru side then its the majority that wont be going home saying the railway staff dont care. Because we do and we should show it.

or do you think we shouldnt?

 

[The Barlow Boy]

He come's across like too many people from public schools do, arrogant and stuck up their own ar*e.. which is a shame, because those odd few that slip through the net get labelled as such, because of idiots like him..

Whereabouts in the article does he states that he was educated at a public school? Methinks that you have a Daily Mirror type chip on your shoulder.

 

[Ibex]

Well in my (probably invalid opinion) you're never going to make passengers happy regardless of if they have information or not, and also regardless of where they were educated. At my station we have an office we can sit in all day the same as Liverpool Street, however during disruption if we were to be caught sitting in this office we would immediately be told to explain ourselves to our line manager.

We had staff on every mainline platform assisting customers as best we could, and a constant stream of announcements, but we still recieved comments on the TOC's official Twitter complaining of our abysmal service and poor communications, just as much as the unstaffed stations! Unless there is a train going from A to B at the time that suits the passenger, they are not happy - fact. You can have Steven Hawking giving them information and they still demand more.

 

[Clip]

Well in my (probably invalid opinion) you're never going to make passengers happy regardless of if they have information or not, and also regardless of where they were educated. At my station we have an office we can sit in all day the same as Liverpool Street, however during disruption if we were to be caught sitting in this office we would immediately be told to explain ourselves to our line manager.

We had staff on every mainline platform assisting customers as best we could, and a constant stream of announcements, but we still recieved comments on the TOC's official Twitter complaining of our abysmal service and poor communications, just as much as the unstaffed stations! Unless there is a train going from A to B at the time that suits the passenger, they are not happy - fact. You can have Steven Hawking giving them information and they still demand more.

And that is the point of his moan - they were sat in this office which IIRC has windows so people can see you sat in there.. Its unacceptable.

And your right you cant please them all, but by being a focal point you are doing a lot more good then bad.

anyone who tries to say any different is a lunatic

 

[Hydro]

I don't think anyone wins from this article. The railways sound bad (and we've seen that the railway hasn't particularly come up trumps on the information front recently), and Mount sounds like a hysterical, hyperbolic little girl. He's stamped his feet, bad news and hysteria sells, the world keeps turning. Class and background don't come into it, a d*ckhead is a d*ckhead, be they undertaking character assassinations of NXEA in the snow, or shooting up in front of their kids in an estate somewhere.

 

[Ibex]

I do apologise for changing the subject very slightly but I'm going to pedantic and nit pick at the headline.

Forget the bad weather; blame the fools, liars, layabouts and thugs who work on our railways

Is Mr Mount forgetting that nationalised railways ceased to exist over 10 years ago? The railways are private property, operated by private companies (with the exception of East Coast) and calling them 'our railways' is completely incorrect of him. They are not owned by the public so if he'd like to refer to them as 'the railways' I'll be much happier.

Also thugs
–noun
1. a cruel or vicious ruffian, robber, or murderer.
2. ( sometimes initial capital letter ) one of a former group of professional robbers and murderers in India who strangled their victims.

Whilst getting from A to B even if did take a lot longer than usual with lack of information, he did not encounter 'thugs'. This article is getting me angrier the more I read it.

Over and out.

 

[Old Timer]

Yet another case of a media reptile using a newspaper to spout their venomous and probably inaccurate view of events.

Sadly the TOCs are now so "customer focussed" or whatever the latest gibbersih is, to take these buggers to task.

The article is simply the means by which a rather unimpressive, and arrogant, individual demonstrates their personality deficiencies to a captive audience in a totally negative manner.

His complete article says much about his attitudes and personality. One rather sympathises with the man's wife, if indeed he has one.

 

[RPM]

I think on the whole most railway staff are as helpful as they can be, but there is the odd "character" who can be less than helpful. Also there are occasions when rail staff as so worn down by abuse and negativity that they don't perhaps show their best side. The pressure on front line staff in disruption really has to be experienced to be believed.

I find a lot of passengers say "there was no information" or "the staff were unhelpful" when what they really mean is "I'm not being told what I want to hear".

 

[Max]

I went to a private school. I studied Latin. Does that automatically make me an "arrogant...stuck-up...snob"? I find some of the comments on here highly offensive and totally discriminatory.

I don't agree with the way the article is written, like some of you I feel it doesn't make the author come across well. But, unlike many of you, I see his frustrations. There are many less than helpful staff on the railways, people who genuinely seem to see passengers as a mere inconvenience, who seem to enjoy seeing passengers suffer in disruption, and many who simply don't give a damn. It is these kind of people who need to be rooted out of customer facing roles. However, this is not to say that there aren't some brilliant staff out there, many of whom I have come across during the disruption in the last week.

It seems like the guy has just been unlucky. Or at least, by the sounds of it, been unlucky on his outward trip and perhaps unfairly taken it out on all staff.

 

[scotsman]

I went to a private school. I studied Latin. Does that automatically make me an "arrogant...stuck-up...snob"? I find some of the comments on here highly offensive and totally discriminatory.

No, my point was that he is looking down on everyone else. He is upper class, I am emphasising this by explemplification. He should know better.

 

[Max]

No, my point was that he is looking down on everyone else. He is upper class, I am emphasising this by explemplification. He should know better.

You said he went to private school and studied Latin and associated these things with unpleasant personal traits. As I said, I find this deeply offensive.

 

[scotsman]

You said he went to private school and studied Latin and associated these things with unpleasant personal traits. As I said, I find this deeply offensive.

I listed his biography, adding he was an arrogant snob at the end. I didn't actually associate any character traits with the fact he went to public school, or I wouldn't have typed it and it would have been implied.

However I did imply that he knew very little about the subject by listing this.

 

[Max]

I listed his biography, adding he was an arrogant snob at the end. I didn't actually associate any character traits with the fact he went to public school, or I wouldn't have typed it and it would have been implied.

However I did imply that he knew very little about the subject by listing this.

If his biography wasn't important it shouldn't have been brought into it. Otherwise you might cause confusion (as you seem to have done with several people in this thread).

 

[Striker]

You said he went to private school and studied Latin and associated these things with unpleasant personal traits. As I said, I find this deeply offensive.

Seriously? Are you really "deeply offended", or are you choosing to be?

 

[monkey]

...I think both clip and max are right. he does come rather venomous, but like all of us can get, is obiously very pee'd off with what seems like atrocious service he's recieved, his background shouldn't really have much to do with it. Whilst there are people with priveleged backgrounds who can be condescending/arrogant and truly are snobs, this is not everyone. I can't really comment on this column writer as I don't know much about him but I think a lot of us with working class backgrounds do tend to have complex (victim attitude if you will) we project on those more priveleged than us which is rather unfair. I know this cos I've done this before, I went out with someone who was had considerably more priveleged background than myself - we used to argue about stuff, until I realised it wasn't them but me who seemed to have chip on my shoulder about it.

now im not sure if you have been to liverpool st of late. Especially on the suburban side. You go through the barriers and all the RPIs and dispatchers hang about in one area until the train has to leave and there is a little office there they can sit in. As soon as something goes wrong(in my experience of doing it every day for about 4 years) they disappear into this office and do not want to come out and help people who have gone through the barriers.

...sadly its not just liverpool st. the frontline staff do this at newcastle a lot, soon as theres problem they scuttle off instead of dealing with passegers who are confused and disorientated from not being told what is going on. like I've said before during the severe weather, people are not by in large unreasonable, they accept there are problems and will be inconveniences - what does get them angry is lack of communication. in my mind that is unacceptable and operators need to take note and remedy this...

 

[Max]

Seriously? Are you really "deeply offended", or are you choosing to be?

Yes. I am offended. Clearly I would not just lie.

 

[TomJ93]

I do find some staff deeply unhelpful, they always seem like the types who are just doing a job and have no real passion for their position/ the industry.

I went to buy a cup of tea on Thursday on a mid day train, the member of staff in question was stacking sandwhiches in a fully open shop and before I even asked her anything she just said "shop not open" to which I replied "when will it be open?" all I got back was "SHOP NOT OPEN." I wasn't asking much of her and all I got was this poorly worded reply.

 

[Skimble19]

Whereabouts in the article does he states that he was educated at a public school? Methinks that you have a Daily Mirror type chip on your shoulder.

Methinks you're wrong, I'd rather read the Daily Fail than that..! Scotsman says he's a public school boy in the post, and I have no reason to not believe him, although why would he write it in his own articles? Mind you, I'm a victim of skim reading here, and read it as private school (and then managed to type public somehow), so my point was completely invalid anyway!

 

[Bedpan]

(Happy Christmas everybody!!) I 've just read the article. What's so sad is that a lot of people will be taken in by it rather than laugh at him for being a complete twit (used the wrong vowel there, I think). The message from the article as I saw it is that its more important to be educated in practical, common sense matters than being able to write books on Latin. Why berate the use of a hairdryer-why not praise the person using it for their ingenuity? I bet there were a load of people working extremely hard in awful conditions to try to sort things out on his journey. I've been left thinking that the adjectives he uses to describe rail workers are more suited to himself. Its just a kick in the teeth for people who have been working their balls off to try to keep the trains running.

Maybe he should travel by car next time, he might then find himself stuck on the road for hours on end with no idea whatsoever about why the traffic has stopped and no idea when he might be able to continue his journey. Then he'd doubtless blame the council workers, as locals here have done,for not grritting the road doubtless oblivious to the fact that the lorries were out on Saturday morning (and again tonight, about an hour ago) and that no amount of salt would have prerented the three inches of snow which fell in an hour and a half on Saturday afternoon from settling.

I had a private boarding school education and thank God I didn't turn out like him! (Not that I wouldn't be severely critical of the railways or anything else if severe critisism is justified).

Hope you don't mind me saying well done to you Scotsman for your comments on the article on the Telegraph website by the way.

 

[GB]

The day this chap is moaning about was last Tuesday or Wednesday when the air temperature was well below sub zero.

The problems started when one of the the LST to Norwich loco hauled sets failed at Marks Tey. Due to the time of the morning (peak) trains quickly queued behind it.

The plan was while a rescue loco was sought, to run down road services bi-di over the up road between Marks Tey and Colchester but unfortunately due to the temperatures and snow the signaller couldn't get reverse on the points. This of course ment that all the trains that were behind the failure were trapped. Eventually the train was dragged to colchester where it was detrained and passengers were told to get the next one which was following close behind.

Of course bad luck aplenty, this train failed outside colchester and had to wait for the rescue loco off the first failure to attach and and bring it into the station. This failed train then formed the next working back to London.

The "tubes" he mentioned were the air cocks on the rescue loco and DVT which were well frozen. They had to use boling water from the restaurant car to un freze them which obviously added extra time.

I had a quick look on TOPS and if you got on the first failure at Liverpool St at about 0600ish, you wouldn't of got to Norwich untill about midday. So that goes to show the extent of delays that occured during the morning.

As for the train at Witham, its common practice during service disruption to hold trains in platforms where possible so this would have been the reason his train was sitting there. IF there were no announcements made then I can't say this is too good!

 

[asylumxl]

This man is proof that an expensive education is not necessarily a better one.

He's a closed-minded, ignorant, opinionated cretin, who hasn't a clue of the basic principles of how a train works, and obviously cannot comprehend the basic concept that the best way to melt ice is with heat.

If he hates rail transport he doesn't need to use it. I'm sure it'd be a blessing for other passengers, and one more seat/standing space for everyone else.

He has a condescending attitude to others, and this is not because of his upbringing in my opinion. It's down to his character, a reflection of how he views himself among the other classes.

To put it rather cruedly, he could be rich or poor, but he'd still be an asshole.