FGW threatens to sue London TravelWatch

[Anonymizeruk]

Just read this article -
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/u ... 246667.ece
Surfice to say, I think its despicable.

Cheers

Gaz

[BR7MT]

Strip them of their cash-cow Greater Western franchise - that will teach them some manners

EDIT: after reading that article; it just won't happen

Regards,

Dan

[Thrashin]

The truth hurts, it seems...

As the comment at the bottom of the article says, exactly what reputation are FGW trying to defend? The one they've got certainly isn't worth defending. Their time would be better spent actually sorting their shocking service out than trying to silence the critics.

Whilst this threat is bang out of order, I have to admit it's given me a good chuckle.

Slaughter and May? Nice...

Jack

[ajax103]

That's wrong but what did the Government do? that's right nothing.

"The Government knew about First Great Western’s attempt to silence the watchdog, but took no action. Mr Harris has acknowledged Mr Cooke’s letter but has yet to answer any of the questions that it contains despite receiving it more than three weeks ago."

I don't know about the services down there but were they any better before First took over the Greater Western franchise? ie when you had First Great Western, Thames Trains and Wessex Trains as three seperate services.

What should happen but it won't, is to strip them of the franchise and renationalise the entire network, it worked when Connex was stripped of their South Central and South Eastern franchises during that time when the SRA was running them, it was good.

"The franchise was originally due to run until 2011, but in June 2003 the Strategic Rail Authority decided to cut the South Eastern franchise short at the end of 2003 due to what it called "poor financial management". Connex South Eastern lost its franchise at midnight on 8 November 2003 when train services were taken over by South Eastern Trains, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Strategic Rail Authority." So could that happen to First?

[enotayokel]

Wessex weren't great but were better then the current lot. And at least had the confidence to hold their hands up when 150 reliability crashed circa 2003 (though it was only for a few weeks)

Local stuff will always be neglected in franchises that have express/commuter stuff aswell

Wonder if it would be better to have a state owned intercity network, with local lines run privately at a local level. With a Nationally devised timetable to ensure connections are made, seems to work on the Continent

[richard222]

maybe fine them £50 million for every 1% under 100% they are and then fine them £10 million for each car they sell or take out of service without replacing it, I think that a similar system should be used nationwide.

Or the other alternative is to give goverment funding as £#million per .1% over, say 70% their figures are, then if they are rubbish, they go bankrupt hehehe

[Riche]

maybe fine them £50 million for every 1% under 100% they are and then fine them £10 million for each car they sell or take out of service without replacing it, I think that a similar system should be used nationwide.

100% punctuality is pretty much impossible in anything but a perfect world.

Also, what a great idea, take more money from the rail operators and hand it to the treasury, of course, that'll bring tons of investment in the railways.

Cheers,
Richard

[mattvince]

DfT cannot take a 'moral high ground' approach to Greater Western, partly because they know that the problems facing FGW are partly of the DfT's making. Greater Western is the most tightly specified franchise in recent times, and contrary to ministerial assertions, the DfT had a very good idea of what they were asking for (certainly in terms of timetable and resource utilisation). DfT are also trying to be masters of the art of Teflon, hence would not want to take over Greater Western (in the same way as the SRA took over Connex South Eastern), as they know it would make them directly responsible for the worst train service in the country. DfT are as responsible as FirstGroup - FG overbid for Greater Western, DfT went for the headline figure without assessing all the risks involved. Bad bidder, bad buyer.

Of course, the wholly Service Level Commitment-compliant FGW timetable doesn't actually work, even on paper. Couple a timetable which doesn't work with a fleet which is too small to accommodate the present traffic, and you have a recipe for disaster. Add in a huge loss of morale, particularly amongst ex-Wessex staff, and you have a fully-baked, Gas Mark 7 disaster. DfT won't do anything until the premium payments (read: Rail Tax) start looking iffy, then expect a quick refranchising exercise. DfT are wary of those, as they know that they could end up with a Treasury deal which is worse off. And Cross-Default of other FirstGroup franchises is unlikely, as that doesn't just give DfT one big problem, but three.

Suing London Travelwatch is just utter stupidity. It sounds like the kind of thing FirstGroup's headquarters would come up with, not FGW.

[ajax103]

Suing London Travelwatch is just utter stupidity. It sounds like the kind of thing FirstGroup's headquarters would come up with, not FGW.

I believe you're right in saying it's the kind of thing that First HQ would do since the guy in charge of the First Group got the letter from London Travelwatch, he gave it to the rottweilers (sorry, lawyers ) so it does look First HQ were responsible for the legal action, they just told FGW to toe the company line and told what to say.

[ianmacmillan]

Looks like the politicians are protecting their future jobs.

Anybody seen an MP going to the highest bidder on Ebay yet?.

[AlistairW]

Worst Great Western stink.

Sue me.


This is probably yet another demoivator for FGW staff and is certainly a good way of angering yet more commuters, Worst Group would have been better of responding to the comments in a formal manner rather than childish "we're right you're wrong" tactics. They're making fools out of themselves in my view.

[timenec]

It just shows what a dog's breakfast the politicians have made of the railways.

[n863dwt]

oh for god sake ... give it a rest.

as has been said this is one of the most tightly specified franchises of all time never mind recent times.

and for the record...
myself and many many others.... consider that the decision to bring the Connex Franchise under government control for that period was down to the governments decision to control and choose who supplied the CTRL domestic stock.

FGW took a while to amalgamate the FGW and Thames Trains operation into an operational body that worked for both sides of the business... and now they are having to deal with adding a further operation to the business and deal with stock that was under maintained and in need of proper work, dealing with having to equalise staff conditions across all 3 companies FGW/FGWL/Wessex and transfer the maintainance to a new unbuilt (at time of franchise start) faclity at an establised busy and operational depot.

as has been said else where when Nat Ex t/a ONE RAilway took over Anglia, FGE and the WA of WAGN and its only recently that ONE has managed to get on an even keel with refurbished stock, removing staff that were in duplicate roles, new stock, new services and they had pretty easy going comitments.

So give your gobs a rest and give First a break cos they as with all operators have to follow the rules and demands laid down by by the SRA or more recently the DfT that dont give a toss about anything other than how much they as government bodies can squeeze out of private companies.

[Orinoco999]

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[BR7MT]

So give your gobs a rest and give First a break cos they as with all operators have to follow the rules and demands laid down by by the SRA or more recently the DfT that dont give a toss about anything other than how much they as government bodies can squeeze out of private companies.

Taking all DMU heavy overhauls in-house was FGW's decision and the botched changeover period meant that they didn't have enough stock to run their services. That was their decision, not DfT's.

This nonsense about sueing the rail passengers watchdog is also FGW's own decision, not the DfT's.

Regards,

Dan