For all those attentive to this website who may have been hoping to go to the meeting in Birmingham tonight, unfortunately I've been trapped at Euston station thanks to privatisation of our railway service. Branson's Virgin trains have had another incident and all trains have been cancelled to Birmingham. All passengers have been advised to travel the next day. Branson is clearly trying to sabotage one of the central planks of my campaign, which is to bring rail back into public ownership.
Coincidentally, I bumped into an angry passenger at the station, fuming at the abysmal service by Branson's Virgin trains. This was noone other than Conservative MP William Cash, ardent advocate of rail privatisation and who under Thatcher voted consistently to undermine our rail service. Poetic justice or what?
23 Comments:
Oh dear, poor Bill.
In fairness, trains and services would still be cancelled sometimes however good the trains were generally run. But Branson's trains might be habitually awful for all I know - I've never had to take one.
I doubt Branson was engaged in intentional sabotage myself though - sadly Brown's ascension to the throne continues to be presumed by all and sundry, and I expect Branson would put his profits first.
He will have to pay compensation to passengers who booked tickets or who have to travel back and have season passes and so on I presume?
On the subject of rail privatisation, nice piece in the Eye today about GNER and others pushing for the government to pay for them to become shareholders in National Rail, so that it can turn into Railtrack 2.
And you didn't consider travelling to brimingham by coach instead? Or don't they have first-class sections? (how else did you bummp into a tory mp?)
"All passengers have been advised to travel the next day."
I presumed that meant there was no coach service? Though I can't say I'd want to go by coach to Birmingham.
where to start with the dismal examples of delays I've suffered due to rail privatisation.... annoying when I miss half of meetings I want to go to..
one particularly inconvenient one was when I recently tried to get into London for a meeting but as the guard on branch line was off sick we couldn't buy tickets (my station being unmanned....also no toilet which has led to some unmentionable incidents when my toddler was potty training, I'll spare you the details....) so the whole train had to get off at Maidenhead and queue for twenty minutes to buy tickets while of course we all missed our connections....
I could go on and on in this vein....
just make sure you have a warm coat, plenty to read and to eat and a phone or change for a phine indeed money for taxis if the train dosen't go at all..... perhaps a tent??? while travelling on Britain's privatised trains, maybe they could an endurance game show about it....!
But seriously that is very bad that you couldn't speak at your meeting John, and I'm glad that the Tory MP was brought down into the real world with a bump. At conference I spent some time explaining to a manager on the Post Office stnad that a mile and a half or a mile uphill is too fat to walk to the next Post Office which they say we must in our area do when they try to close our sub-branches, (some have indeed closed though not my local one due to a sustained local campaign) especially if you are elderly, have small children in tow or simpy want to get home to cook your tea before dark if you can't go till after school time..... the manager in question looked quite discomfited and seemed to be emitting aahs of recognition as if to say oh yes I see what you mean of course it's not possible.... a bit late now though isn't it?! I bet none of the PO managers actually walked the distance with less mobile people in tow, and it sounds like ditto with the privatising MPs! Another enormous mine field is the mess that fares are now in with all the different services the other day at Hayes the ticket seller just couldn't work out what fare I needed at all, in the meantime the queue was building up behind me and I was afraid other people would start missing their trains.....
this is why privatisation destroys morale, the ticket seller is going to bear the brunt of frustrated passenger and people will miss their connections......
On the subject of morale a lot has been reported about the undesrstandable lack of morale of our troops in Iraq especially with Christams coming. I don't know which FM is on but I think you can get the Forces radio BFBS I used to listen to in Germany here and I remember they used to have whole programmes on the state of morale of the forces in places like Germany, Cyprus and Belize where the troops were then, now we are in Iraq and Afghanistan etc I can't imagine there is any other topic
just thought of a good example of public service to do with the railways.. some time last summer a passenger who was waiting with me at our station at the end of the branch was taken ill with an epileptic fit. Several of us had mobiles (lucky as no phone or help point at our abysmal unmanned station which only has a cleaner for about half an hour a week as the poor chap who does it has to drive round to several other stations as well, this could also be a security risk if rubbish etc is left in the bin bags they have too long...)but before we could phone for an ambulance the staff of the train which had just arrived came out and took charge of the situation, phoned for an ambulance and did sensible things like checked the girl's pockets for info and indeed found a prescription which told us she was indeed and epileptic and we made sure she couldn't bump her head by padding it with a jumper - I've done first aid in the past but I had forgotten to look for clues like medical documentation; the staff then stayed with her until the ambulance came which they didn't have to do as there were other passengers like me there but it was really kind of them to see it through. Ok they held up the train so some people may have been late but it could have been a matter of life and death; indeed I also witnessed the tail end of an incident on the tube at Bond Street recently where it had in fact been that as a man had nearly died on the tube but just after I passed him being stretchered away and reached my platform you could hear people who didn't know why htey had been delayed moaning on about the delays but the tube staff were explaining to them that someone had just nearly died...these jobs are stressful enough without being squeezed ny privatisation and I can't imagine that privatised companies would pay for proper First Aid and Health and Safety training if it wasn't for pressure from the trade unions yet if the RMT for example stike on health and safety grounds all you get in the mainstream media is reports of how it is inconveniencing passengers or rather CONSUMERS as everything is reduced to this level now isn't it? Grrr!
I think the reference to Branson's sabotage was tongue-in-cheek (to the humourless anonymous who posted first).
Btw, Branson didn't name his company Virgin because no one would shag him (which they probably won't), but because it's based in the US Virgin Isles - a tax haven, where Branson merrily converts public rail subsidy into tax-free shareholder dividend.
And nice to see New Labour's advertising campaign against benefit cheats - no mention of the billions defrauded in tax by the rich and through corporate tax avoidance (about 100x what some poor single mum mistakenly misclaims).
You try expressing tone on the internet :P My own joke was about his profits.
Just in response to Scrybe
No there was no coach service offered but I tried elsewhere just in case and the time of arrival would have been about 10pm after the planned meeting. As for the first class jibe, I met Bill Cash on the platform. I haven't travelled First Class in my life and don't intend to start now.
By the way when they asked Harry Perkins in "A Very British Coup" whether he was going to abolish First Class he replied "No, I am going to abolish Second Class."
As far as the railways nowadays - recently I have had to travel by Virgin train from Oxford to attend the Sheriff's Court in Ayr where they are supposed to be dealing with the Weapons Inspectors who went into Prestwick Airport last August to look for US weapons going to Israel - I found out on the journey that: in the last three years the amount of travelers has doubled - to try to meet this increase they have put on more, shorter trains with the result that there is enormous competition for the lines at junctions. This is one of the main reasons there are so many delays on the West Coast Line - If you have the misfortune to have to travel on Friday or Sunday there is absolutely no legal limit to the number of passengers they can let on the train NOR to the temperature they can submit you to.
Oh for a unified system !
Sarah L
What would be so bad about travelling first class, in theory? It's a bit dodgy if it's on expenses, but if it's in cash, well, something to do on your birthday? :)
@sarah - nice of them to add some trains though rather than going the first group route, ie, *Reduce* seats and hike prices up (which should be banned in the franchise contract, surely?).
On the subject of Labour party members and public transport, read top post:
http://www.5thnovember.blogspot.com/
(now post below top - the one about Gordon Brown)
wow, I feel somewhat honoured to have merited a "just in response" comment, especially after I didn't speak to you at the clp event the other night but was accosted by jim fitz while waiting to have a brief word with charles.
what to say in response?
the first class 'jibe' was actually more about the idea of a tory mp deigning to travel anywhere else.
agreed on the "abolish second class" comment - it is, after all in keeping with one's outlook if one subscribes to marx's theory of alienation (which, incidently, I do - although I reject other aspects of his theoretics, the economic and philosophic manuscripts of 1844 are possibly the most potent modern political philosophy ever done, IMO - rather similar in outlook, yet way more systematic, to Henry David Thoreau's liberal views..Marx was a strongly humanistic writer and his views are too often misunderstood).
How does that suffice? Does it garner another "just for scrybe" post? (crosses fingers)
having realised the tone of that may have not been evident, and that I may have sounded like I was feigning my marxist credentials, I ought to provide this link as demonstration: http://thalondondiaries.blogspot.com/2006/12/forthcoming-posts.html
and the post about why I am a marxist shall be up soon.
"his views are too often misunderstood"
Agree.
alas, it seems not.
http://ec.europa.eu/comm/competition/state_aid/legislation/91l237_en.html
I only just found this! In all this time!
It seems we don't actually have *any* choice about whether the railways are private or not, and even very little choice in how they're operated.
I actually found the link on the UKIP site...but I've checked and the fruitcake party is correct here as far as I can tell:
On Railway Management
"Member States must guarantee that railway undertakings are afforded a status of independent operators behaving in a commercial manner and adapting to market needs"
"Railway undertakings shall be managed according to the principles which apply to commercial companies"
On How Much Control We Have On This
"Member States may bring any question concerning the implementation of this Directive to the attention of the Commission. After consulting the committee provided for in paragraph 2 on these questions, the Commission shall take the appropriate decisions."
(my italics).
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