Network Rail brings repairs in house!

nightbeaver911 · Post by **nightbeaver911** » Fri Oct 24, 2003 10:43 am

The may of already been covered but still:

Finally, the first step to renationalisation or at least the big 4.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/3210095.stm

johndibben · Post by **johndibben** » Fri Oct 24, 2003 11:19 am

A welcomed step for the safety of passengers and the government can again be held to account for such matters.

That's about as far as it can go though without it getting expensive.

New stock could be provided by governement inderictly and offered to franchises. Very awkward politically though as it would be competing with the present owners and there would be howls of protest from them.

Franchises could be allowed to run out but the service would deteriorate in the short term. It's a question of political expediency. This would not have happened but for the some very tragic events.

It's a shame people have to die before the government acts or previous actions are seen to be very ill thought out.

LucaZone · Post by **LucaZone** » Fri Oct 24, 2003 12:02 pm

Yeah but isnt it just the same workers doing the same repairs,and instead of having Company B pay them, Company A are.

doownyl · Post by **doownyl** » Fri Oct 24, 2003 1:14 pm

True, but Company A (Network Rail) makes no profit and has no shareholders to be held accountable to, only their members (SRA, ATOC etc). Hence money will be saved because no cash at all will be heading into private pockets.

Zackybong1 · Post by **Zackybong1** » Fri Oct 24, 2003 6:00 pm

1) Bring in signals, track and estates in house (re-nationalise)
2) Deny such re-nationalisation and call it "rationalisation"

then
3) Wait until all old stock is replaced with new stock, wait for a couple more crashes due to faulty trains
4) "Rationalise" TOCs.

Just want to put this on the record so that in 5 years I can dig it out again.

GatExp · Post by **GatExp** » Fri Oct 24, 2003 7:54 pm

Introduce an Aviation style of regulation.

No-one would have stood for it had the UK's airlines had these problems.

Why don't they?

Because the system works, that's why.

micksasse · Post by **micksasse** » Fri Oct 24, 2003 8:04 pm

This is a welcome step - a small one, but at least one in the right direction. I love, however, New Labour's protestations "Oh, no, it's not partial renationalisation" - they'll do anything to distance themselves from a wise and politically popular idea!

Talking of which, it's a complete fallacy that renationalisation would be expensive, even in the short term: the railways already receive ca. Â£4bn of subsidy per year, i.e. working capital. Any capitalist (bank, venture capital co. etc) would take a stake in the management and control of the relevant business in return, be it by appointing directors or by obtaining share capital (or very likely both).

Similarly, the public should receive shares (new shares, that is) in return for the subsidies advanced - the shareholding increasing year-on-year as annual subsidies are advanced, until, oh look, we have a renationlised railway without needing to pay large bungs to shareholders.

Then, as controlling shareholder, the state could combine the organisations into one (as was done in 1948) in order to recreate a unified and efficient management and operating structure.

It's a sort of capitalist way towards a socialist organisation...

Kevo00 · Post by **Kevo00** » Sat Oct 25, 2003 12:06 am

This doesn't represent any sort of renationalisation as Network Rail is not nationalised - it is not owned by the nation or the state.

What is important here is that money that would previously have been squandered on contractor's profits will hopefully go into maintainance. The biggest concern given that the staff number 18,000 and are to be inherited by NR is the level of training given to these staff. NR will clearly have to totally retrain many of these people and instill a new Health and Safety aware corporate culture to get any sort of result here. Its obvious that the people working there today have not been trained correctly if they "forget" to put the blades of points back in after working with them, and the main manifestation of this new corporate culture taking root will be a lack of maintenance related accidents. Retraining should also increase the productivity and profitability of the business in turn improving the railways image.

johndibben · Post by **johndibben** » Sat Oct 25, 2003 9:21 am

Again, the the enormous changes since 1948 make comparisons difficult. Even shareholders would not react the same way today to changes. There's a lot more of them as well ....

In that money was raised by privatisation to, in part, fund tax cuts for a short period, nationalisation must incur costs.

The real expense is political. Big business would not like renationalisation and Party funding could be reduced.

I'm acutely aware that any government's first priority is remaining in power and funding to con the the public at election time is essential.

That sounds terribly cynical but politicians work in a very cynical environment. The free-thinkers and good one's get nowhere at best and ridiculed at worst. I assume that's why the government never does anything radical and relies on constant tinkering with fudges and promises ....