Renationisation Worries?

[TahiPanasDua]

Yes of course Gryff, but surely you are not suggesting that the Labour Government of the day was unduly influencing Fred when he behaved like an all conquering megalomaniac in 2007/8? I am sorry but I do not see the relevance of either RBS or East Coast in this discussion. Private enterprise all by itself managed to drive these into the ground.

Dod

Dod,

I agree that RBS seemed to do it all by themselves but the East Coast line is less obvious. Criticising the rail companies is often justified but, in so doing, many people forget that the railway lines, signalling and bigger stations are all government owned and controlled. This contributes mightily to the level of service which is perceived to be so c--p. It is also generally accepted that the government botched the tenders for many line franchises, Are you surprised? Companies were asked to tender based on the government's overly optimistic passenger projections which therefore never materialised. As a result, some of the rail companies found it difficult in the extreme to provide a high level of service and make a profit.

The blame is not so one-sided.

TP2.

[daveh]

Yes of course Gryff, but surely you are not suggesting that the Labour Government of the day was unduly influencing Fred when he behaved like an all conquering megalomaniac in 2007/8? I am sorry but I do not see the relevance of either RBS or East Coast in this discussion. Private enterprise all by itself managed to drive these into the ground.

Dod

Dod,

I agree that RBS seemed to do it all by themselves but the East Coast line is less obvious. Criticising the rail companies is often justified but, in so doing, many people forget that the railway lines, signalling and bigger stations are all government owned and controlled. This contributes mightily to the level of service which is perceived to be so c--p. It is also generally accepted that the government botched the tenders for many line franchises, Are you surprised? Companies were asked to tender based on the government's overly optimistic passenger projections which therefore never materialised. As a result, some of the rail companies found it difficult in the extreme to provide a high level of service and make a profit.

The blame is not so one-sided.

TP2.

Did they? (tender based on the government's overly optimistic passenger projections which therefore never materialised). I thought the companies generally tendered on their own over optimistic passenger projection, offering rather too much money to the government for the franchise particularly in later years (at least for the East coast Line) in order the win the franchise from the competition. They then come a cropper when they can't make money in the later years of the franchise due to the lower than expected passenger numbers. They have often complained of planned/promised upgrades to track, signalling, electrification being delayed/canned which have impacted their predicted passenger numbers.

I have experience of the East Coast main line and have had pretty good service generally from the privatised services, and from when it was taken back into direct control, my memories of the old British Rail days are not so good though.
I think this may be going a bit off topic though a number of HYPable companies do run rail franchises.