rockershovel Posted June 10, 2018 Share Posted June 10, 2018 ... looking at the latest news regarding the new timetables, it’s difficult to avoid the conclusion that there is no functional oversight of the railways at all; that the whole system depends upon the assumption that “someone else understands this stuff” Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold rodent279 Posted June 15, 2018 RMweb Gold Share Posted June 15, 2018 Apparently, according to a post on Faceache, "64% of people support renationalising the railways". https://fullfact.org/economy/do-public-want-railways-renationalised/ Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Covkid Posted June 15, 2018 Share Posted June 15, 2018 Apparently, according to a post on Faceache, "64% of people support renationalising the railways". https://fullfact.org/economy/do-public-want-railways-renationalised/ But I wonder how many of those 64% are aware of how much of the railway industry is already state owned. As an easy example the Arriva group which operate ATW, XC, Chiltern, Lorol and Northern Trains is owned by DB which is owned by the German Federal government - hence state owned - just not the UK government. Abellio is part owned by the state owned Dutch railways and runs Scotrail and Anglia. Network Rail is Government owned too. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium jjb1970 Posted June 15, 2018 RMweb Premium Share Posted June 15, 2018 And how many understand that just about all the important decisions are already made by the government or the state owned NR? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
locoholic Posted June 15, 2018 Share Posted June 15, 2018 And how many understand that just about all the important decisions are already made by the government or the state owned NR? Doesn't really matter, does it, when the private TOCs are willing to keep quiet and take the flak (even getting the CEO to resign) for the current farces? It's increasingly evident that the whole point of the rail franchise model really is to deflect blame from the government, and create short-term jobs for senior executives, who are presumably assured quietly that they will be looked after in the likely event that they are required to fall on their sword. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ron Ron Ron Posted June 15, 2018 Share Posted June 15, 2018 (edited) Apparently, according to a post on Faceache, "64% of people support renationalising the railways". https://fullfact.org/economy/do-public-want-railways-renationalised/ It appears to be a popular opinion, but whether you agree with it or not, that opinion is 99.9% based on ignorance. How many members of the general public know that the railways are publicly owned, i.e. "nationalised"? How many know that the train operating company don't own the rails or infrastructure that the trains run on, or that most of the problems and delays that occur are a result of infrastructure issues ( e.,g. signal or points faults) and not the fault of the TOCs? How many people know that many of the TOC's are required to return very high levels of premium payments to the tax payer and that the so called "vast private profits" amount to a very low (in fact tiny) percentage of turnover? How many people citing that when the ICEC franchise was run by East Coast (so called "nationalised") it made a profit and returned a a £billion to the tax payer, realise that the "failed" VTEC franchise was making a bigger profit on its rail operation than East Coast had done and had returned a reported circa £700 million to the tax payer in just 3 years? Apparently, all the franchises are supposed to be run by foreign state owned railway companies !!!! WCML - Virgin & Stagecoach - British. ECML - Stagecoach & Virgin - British. GWML and the SW of England - First Group - British MML - Stagecoach - British. SW (One of the biggest franchises) - For 21 years was SWT (Stagecoach - British) and is now SWR (Majority owned by First - British). TransPennine Express - First Group - British. Govia - Southeastern, the troubled Southerm, Thameslink, Great Northern franchise and until only a few months ago, London Midland - is 65% British (Go-ahead group). The remaining 35% is owned by French company Keolis, making Govia just 24.5% owned by SNCF. The "foreign owned" franchises. C2C (TrenItalia) is a comparatively tiny franchise. DB owned Arriva group franchises, Chiltern, ATW, Northern, Cross-Country (Grand Central and London Overground are not franchises) and those run by Dutch NS subsidiary Abelio (Scotrail, Greater Anglia and 70% of new operator West Midland Trains) amount to less that 20% of the whole passenger operation. Some food for thought....some 67% of all rail passenger journeys in the UK take place and are wholly contained within London and the SE of England. In other words, the overwhelming number of rail journeys that take place in the UK, are on trains run by British owned, or British majority owned rail franchises. . . Edited June 15, 2018 by Ron Ron Ron 5 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold rodent279 Posted June 15, 2018 RMweb Gold Share Posted June 15, 2018 I offer no opinion, just put it out there. Regarding the above-try telling that to your average Joe and they just don't believe you. They are so hooked on the rubbish they read in their chosen daily, they just can't accept anyone who tells them otherwise. It's like a drug. They've been told something is wrong, and that something must be done about it, but they've no real idea what. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
admiles Posted June 15, 2018 Share Posted June 15, 2018 They've been told something is wrong, and that something must be done about it, but they've no real idea what. What about a referendum? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold rodent279 Posted June 15, 2018 RMweb Gold Share Posted June 15, 2018 What about a referendum? Let's not go there. 1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
009 micro modeller Posted June 15, 2018 Share Posted June 15, 2018 Although perhaps not directly related, how are the open access ECML intercity operators doing at the moment? I only ask as a few years ago Grand Central was apparently making a loss. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ron Ron Ron Posted June 15, 2018 Share Posted June 15, 2018 Although perhaps not directly related, how are the open access ECML intercity operators doing at the moment? I only ask as a few years ago Grand Central was apparently making a loss. The last filed annual results for Hull Trains (March 2017) show a turnover of over £31 million (up from £30.1 million in 2016) with an operating profit of over £6.6 million (up from £5.6 million in 2016). Overall profit was £5.345 million. They are investing £68 million in their new Class 802 train fleet. The last filing I could find for Grand Central, was December 2016, so a year out of date. Turnover was up on 2015 at £45.4 million. Profit up on 2015 at £6.9 million. . Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
cravensdmufan Posted June 18, 2018 Share Posted June 18, 2018 (edited) Rebranding already started at Peterborough. Edited June 18, 2018 by cravensdmufan 4 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mike Storey Posted June 19, 2018 Share Posted June 19, 2018 Quite nice. Much more subtle than we have been used to. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
cravensdmufan Posted June 19, 2018 Share Posted June 19, 2018 Quite nice. Much more subtle than we have been used to. I agree. IMO the whole Virgin gimmiky theme was is cheap and tacky eg "clucking lovely egg sandwiches" "ex's sweater", "don't plug in toasters" "baby it's cold outside" and all the rest of it! It would be nice if we got some GNER type of quality back. The ECML deserves it. The Virgin spin even carries on announcing LNER! https://www.virgintrainseastcoast.com/about-us/lner-is-coming/ Note "WE look forward to welcoming you aboard LNER", and "OUR" commitments include delivery of ongoing timetable improvements and launching the new Azuma trains that will revolutionise East Coast rail travel". Oh, and it seems all those stickers are hard to remove! 3 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ken.W Posted June 19, 2018 Share Posted June 19, 2018 (edited) I agree. IMO the whole Virgin gimmiky theme was is cheap and tacky eg "clucking lovely egg sandwiches" "ex's sweater", "don't plug in toasters" "baby it's cold outside" and all the rest of it! It would be nice if we got some GNER type of quality back. The ECML deserves it. The Virgin spin even carries on announcing LNER! https://www.virgintrainseastcoast.com/about-us/lner-is-coming/ Note "WE look forward to welcoming you aboard LNER", and "OUR" commitments include delivery of ongoing timetable improvements and launching the new Azuma trains that will revolutionise East Coast rail travel". Oh, and it seems all those stickers are hard to remove! Well you can say that, I couldn't possibly comment Confirmed in internal email this morning, David Horne (MD), and all but two of the current VTEC directors are staying on.... Edited June 19, 2018 by Ken.W Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Danim Posted June 20, 2018 Share Posted June 20, 2018 (edited) A photo of the temporary lner livery has been uploaded to the lner Facebook page https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1835446670091147&id=1821885668113914 Edited June 20, 2018 by Danim Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
009 micro modeller Posted June 20, 2018 Share Posted June 20, 2018 Oh, and it seems all those stickers are hard to remove! Surely an opportunity with this picture for a topical cake box challenge entry with some people replacing the VTEC branding. And then to keep it topical in a few months/years time you just change the stickers to relate to another franchise... 3 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Oakydoke Posted June 20, 2018 Share Posted June 20, 2018 Confirmed in internal email this morning, David Horne (MD), and all but two of the current VTEC directors are staying on.... Why not if the company was being run with a good operational profit, before premium payments had to be taken into account? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ken.W Posted June 20, 2018 Share Posted June 20, 2018 Why not if the company was being run with a good operational profit, before premium payments had to be taken into account? As I said, I couldnt comment myself, and that was a statement of fact, but some previous posts were hoping for an end to the Virgin style hype With the same senior management staying on it appears they may be disappointed. Why not? The same could also have been said of the previous EC management, but it seems unusual for senior management to remain the same after a franchise change. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
jim.snowdon Posted June 20, 2018 Share Posted June 20, 2018 The difference is As I said, I couldnt comment myself, and that was a statement of fact, but some previous posts were hoping for an end to the Virgin style hype With the same senior management staying on it appears they may be disappointed. Why not? The same could also have been said of the previous EC management, but it seems unusual for senior management to remain the same after a franchise change. The difference appears to be that this time, the franchise was terminated early (by the state) as a consequence of the infrastructure improvements necessary to allow the TOC to deliver on its side of the bargain not being delivered (by the state), rather than on account of the franchised TOC either failing to deliver or deciding to hand back the keys. Jim Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold stovepipe Posted June 20, 2018 RMweb Gold Share Posted June 20, 2018 Eh? VTEC were trying to renegotiate their contract due to them losing money within 2 years of taking over. The upgrades weren't due to be delivered from a timetabling point of view until the start of year 4. It was mutually convenient to end the contract to save face for both sides. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
lmsforever Posted June 20, 2018 Share Posted June 20, 2018 It will be interesting to see how LNER will perform when they start running services I bet the DFT wont harass them and NR will not be chased over the upgrades .I think some people on this thread do not understand how business works Virgin/ Stagecoach stopped because if they carried on it would have impacted on the rest of their operations and we could have had another Carrillion.Employees would have lost their jobs, services would not have run and then the anti Virgin groups would have had a field day of mis information.They went into the ECML with their eyes open and found that they just could not make it work,all power to them for taking the steps they did .This stopped a serious event of a bankrupt company having to stop, lay off staff and services not running then what would have been said on this thread.The new company will not add new services , just keep the status quo and hopefully make money.New trains are a bonus and the work will have been done to make them reliable and staff trained to operate them so a job they wont have to do.The real interesting time will be the new franchise or what ever cock up is hatched by people who probably have not a clue about railways perhaps the COOP will run it? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold stovepipe Posted June 20, 2018 RMweb Gold Share Posted June 20, 2018 Not really - the liability to the parent company was the value of the bond supplied as part of the franchise agreement - £165m. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
lmsforever Posted June 20, 2018 Share Posted June 20, 2018 Still a sizeable amount of money to lose no company would want that . Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
QuoitsPlayer Posted June 20, 2018 Share Posted June 20, 2018 I hope this link is okay with Mods if not I apologise. LNER Azuma on Twitter tonight: https://mobile.twitter.com/RichieVeitch/status/1009541799709499395/photo/1 Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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