#rail privatisation

[thoughtlessarse]

MPs say no to competition on the railways, fear services will worsen - DutchNews.nl

MPs from across the political spectrum have said they do not back European Commission wishes to allow more competition on the Dutch railway

MPs from across the political spectrum have said they do not back European Commission wishes to allow more competition on the Dutch railway networks because they fear a worse service for travellers.

Under EU rules, other companies should be offered the opportunity to provide mainline services, as well as night trains and cross border connections.

‘Our complex network is not suitable for major privatisation,’ CDA MP Harry van der Molen said during Tuesday’s debate. The VVD is the only party which thinks injecting more market forces into the system will improve performance.

Both MPs and the cabinet want to continue awarding the mainline concession to the NS, which is 100% state owned. The new concession period is due to run from 2025 to 2035.

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If you want to see how bad competition, i.e. privatisation, is for a rail system just look at the UK. It has been a disaster which has given the UK the most expensive rail ticket prices in Europe and pathetic services. This is now talk of nationalising the railways there. Cross border competition would probably be okay, but leave national systems alone.

[davidhencke]

Revealed: How "Failing Grayling" derailed transport billionaires Richard Branson and Brian Souter

Revealed: How “Failing Grayling” derailed transport billionaires Richard Branson and Brian Souter

Ex transport secretary Chris Grayling Pic credit:BBC

Chris Grayling – who tomorrow is expected to become chair of Parliament’s intelligence and security committee – is a byword for wasting public money.

I have already written for Byline Times on his activities – and so extensive were his failings it took two long articles to add up the cost of Chris Grayling. You can read them here and

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[angelholme]

Rail crisis: Your train horror stories

Passengers caught up in the recent rail disruption share their stories of train travel woe.

Privatised Train Networks.

Train prices have been rising above inflation every year for what? At least the past ten years.

And for what - so we can have trains that are overcrowded when they are running at all? 

We have the shittiest rail network in Europe and we pay the most for it.

God Bless Margaret Thatcher and her Tory Government.

She must be looking up at us, feeling so proud of the job she’s done.

[secondgenerationimmigrant]

Helpstop the 4th railway package = rail privatisation all over the place

Another one for the Euro-tumblerites, and by that I mean anyone who lives in Europe, no matter their descent. You are my compatriots andI will fight alongside you.

Help stop the EU's Fourth Railway Package, because the EU doesn’t usually F-s it up, but when it does, you get this.

The Fourth Railway Package is a new set of regulations coming out of the European Commission that aims to impose privatisation on domestic rail passenger services in every EU member state.

The proposals will make the competitive tendering of rail passenger services mandatory.

And it will enforce the separation of train operation from infrastructure management, the split that has led to so much fragmentation, inefficiency and cost in the UK.

What's the problem?

Currently every EU state has the freedom to choose which way it wants to run its railways. These measures will remove that freedom, imposing a model of fragmentation and privatisation that has been an abject failure in the UK.

This will remove any chance of a future UK government establishing alternative ways of delivering our railways. It will make it impossible to run a successful and publicly owned railway such as we currently see on the East Coast Main Line.

Any political successes we make in promoting the case for public ownership on our railways will come undone by EU regulations.

The Fourth Railway Package must be stopped.

Email your MEP and ask them to oppose the Fourth Railway Package in the European Parliament

[socialistsquirrel]

The real great train robbery 20 years on

Today is 20 years since John Major’s rail privatisation began after 50 years of nationalisation. Labour’s shadow transport secretary Lilian Greenwood has said “Rail privatisation got off to a bumpy start and 20 years on it’s clear that it isn’t delivering for passengers. Our railways are up to 40% less efficient than the best networks and passengers have been saddled with some of the highest fares in Europe. The privatisation of all rail infrastructure was an unmitigated disaster that placed passengers in danger. There must be no going back to the dark days of railtrack but the Conservatives risk repeating the worst mistakes of the past.” General secretary of the transport union the RMT Mick Cash also said “Today marks two decades of privatisation and the legalised larceny on our railways which has bled billions of pounds away from profits while passengers are condemned to travel in rammed-out, unsafe, clapped-out trains. Twenty years of profiteering by greedy operators has left Britain, the nation that gave the railways to the world, jammed in the slow lane. The only answer is a reversal of the great rail rip-off and a return of public ownership.” After 20 years of privatisation it is clear that this ideological experiment with our railways has failed the British people and a return of the railways to public hands is desperately needed.