Compass - All On Board

ALL ON BOARD
A PUBLICLY OW NED RAILWAY
F O R A N I N T E R C O N N E C T E D WO R L D
ALL ON
BOARD
interconnected world
A publicly owned railway for an
Click here to take action for
public rail on our website
Page 2
www.compassonline.org.uk
ompass
together
for a good society
We live in an amazing
country full of amazing
people it should be
everyones right to get to
travel round it; from our
home or work, and when
we feel like it, get to see
the people we love and all
those beautiful places. Our
railways should be
accessible to all, and not
be the preserve of the rich
or the able-bodied.
The trains and stations
should be beautiful,
reflecting the special place
in our hearts for a public
realm in which we all feel
free and are treated as
equals. Working together,
we can have a public
transport system that gives
all of us the freedom to do
and feel all of these things.
Travelling by train in Britain today doesnt lift our hearts
and doesnt set us free. The experience could be so
much better. If every penny from passengers fares
and the taxpayer was invested in the network, trains
could run more frequently, especially where they are
few and far between. Late and unreliable services
could become a rarity as could dirty trains and
cancellations because of faults. More stations could
be kept staffed helping us all feel safer and better
informed. And under one owner, us, ticket prices
could be much more affordable and we wouldnt need
Compass - ALL ON BOARD:
a PhD in applied maths to understand the ludicrous

ticketing and pricing structure. The tragedy is not just
that the experience of trying to travel by train is far too
often infuriating, disappointing and slightly miserable,
the tragedy is that it could be so much better in an
age when more and more of us want to travel more of
the time.
Trains could be priced at a level more people could
afford. Trains could be run in a way that ensures that
everyone who has bought a ticket gets to sit in a seat
not an outrageous demand surely? Trains could run
on time to more places, more of the time. Maybe we
could even set our watches by them? Trains could be
modern and highly environmentally friendly. Stations
could be beautiful public spaces in which waiting is a
pleasure because they are built and run for people
trying to move around pleasurably together - not just
another place to go shopping. Trains and stations
would be places where we are citizens and not just
consumers - with comfortable seats and lots of them,
free wifi and public art. We should feel good about
traveling by train, it shouldnt be an ordeal - something
we must endure.
However, for too many passengers thats exactly what
it is something to be endured. Why? Its not that
politicians really want us to experience a miserable
service. The people who work on railways, the
drivers, guards, station staff, signallers, managers,
engineers, infrastructure workers, admin/support staff
and cleaners try their very best to provide a vital public
service of which they are incredibly proud. They are
infuriated that common sense and huge amounts of
knowledge, wisdom and commitment to the service
count for nothing. And we, the travelling public, want it
to work and be better.
No, the problem is the existence of a fundamental
structural flaw at the heart of our railway system that
stops us getting what we want: our railway should
never have been privatised and broken up.
Privatisation was based on a flawed logic, the
pretence that rail companies could somehow compete
on the same stretch of track and that bogus
competition would drive up investment and standards.
Follow us on Twitter @CompassOffice
Page 3
ALL ON BOARD:
A publicly owned railway for an interconnected world
It hasnt worked and it wont ever work. Its time to

end the privatised railway experiment that has gone
on too long it is time to bring the railway system
back together and to be run for the public and by the
public.
Privatisation has meant:
Lets be crystal clear. The old British Rail was given a

bad press. It was never the total failure some made it
out to be. It cost less than the current wasteful system
and was more punctual. Innovations like Inter-City
really worked. But there is no going back, even
though it would be better than what we have now.
The world has moved on massively and while the
answer to Britains railways malaise is public
ownership it has to take a very different form than 60
years ago. It must be open, accountable, responsive
and be capable of constant improvement and
innovation because of the everyday input of the
people who work for the railways and the people who
travel on it.
The future of Britains

railways could be hugely
exciting but only if the
system is reintegrated,
under public ownership
and run in the public
interest.
Before we set out how that might happen, and unlike
when rail was privatised in 1993, we need to be clear
about whats going wrong and what the principles
behind a new public railway would be.
There is no risk for these companies, as the state will

always step in to sort out any failure, but they enjoy
huge private rewards.iii
The private rail

system is broken
The figures, facts and experiences speak for
themselves rail privatisation just hasnt worked.
It was both ill-conceived and poorly executed.
Trains are often either over crowded or empty as
they run alongside congested motorways. Pricing
people off trains is hardly a solution in a world in
which connectivity is increasingly both
economically and socially essential. The system is
fragmented, bureaucratic and wasteful.
Page 4
Costs to us, the taxpayer, are three times as

much as under British Rail (BR)i. The additional
costs of privatisation are estimated at around
1.2bn a year.ii
Britain has the highest fares in Europe.
Fare structures are a nightmare. Manchester
Piccadilly station, for example, has six train
operators all with their own fare structure. The
pressure to be on the right train at the right time
is so off-putting and the lack of flexibility is a
huge problem.
Trains are often over-crowded despite the poor
service because of rising fuel costs and
demographic changes.
Growth in passenger numbers has largely
reflected increases in GDP, changes in
employment patterns, and the relative cost of
motoring sadly not because the system is
better. We travel more by train despite the quality
of rail system, not because of it.
Public money is too easily and quickly turned into
profits for private Train Operating Companies
(TOCs) and Rolling Stock Companies (ROSCOs).
Significant public subsidy is ploughed into the
system but rarely touches the sides as it ends up
in private companys bank accounts. 500m has
been taken out of West Coast main line alone.
Private investment has never materialised

and innovation in rolling stock, stations and
service has been poor as one would expect
from any private monopoly with no levers of
accountability.
There is a historic and growing problem that the
capital costs of running a public service railway
are not, and have never been, sufficiently covered
by the farebox alone, requiring on-going public
subsidy. Privatisation has failed to create a
sustainable funding solution, which instead, has
been met through a massive increase in Network
Rail debt, currently set to top 45bn by the end
of the decade. No train system in the world
genuinely makes money. Its a vital public service
that the public just has to pay for through fares
and taxes to get the benefits.
ompass
together
for a good society
There is no strategic plan for investment in the

manufacture of rolling stock that provides
sustainable and coordinated opportunities for UK
jobs and businesses. The lack of a guiding mind
on procurement has resulted in a rollercoaster of
feast and famine leading to the loss of highly
skilled and qualified staff. New rolling stock is
manufactured abroad while, quelle surprise, all
French trains are built in France.
Public ownership is ruled out as an option in the
UK but 60% of franchises are in effect owned by
foreign state owned companies. It seems other
publics can own our railways just not
the British public.
The franchise process to win the contracts
encourages the gaming of wildly optimistic
passenger number projections and this,
combined with huge legal contract complexity
has led to franchise failures and operating chaos
of which the East and West Coast lines are only
the most recent examples.
Staff are too often disregarded or seen as an
asset to squeeze and not seen as a rich resource
of ideas, innovation and commitment.
National economic success is held back because
commuting is too expensive or trains are too
infrequent or non-existent.
Wider economic and social development is
frustrated by the lack of connections and poor
integration; houses in many parts of the country
remain empty because there are insufficient train
connections, while elsewhere people are
homeless.
Women in particular would feel safer on trains
and in stations that were properly staffed and
made secure.
Less able-bodied people are treated like second
class citizens and prevented from catching any
train they want, when they want, on the day, as
they have to phone ahead to ensure there is
someone there to help.
Freight is an afterthought rather than a priority to
help get Britain economically active and
transporting goods in a more sustainable way.
All the time we are missing out on the no brainer
of using a transport method that would lower
pollution getting people out of cars and goods
off lorries and onto trains.
The system is broken and it needs fixing, but it is more

than facts and figures that are wrong. What we are
losing is something equally precious places and
spaces in which we arent just consumers of rail but
equal citizens. Railways and trains cant just be sliced
and diced, commoditised and privatised without a
great national sense of moral, cultural and emotional
loss. Stations and trains are one of the few places left
where we literally rub shoulders as equals.
Trains dont just connect the country geographically
but socially and culturally. They help build a sense of
national, regional and local pride as well as collective
identity. This experience should be joyful and rich not
cheap and tacky. When we travel, in public with
others, the experience should profit our wellbeing not
just the bank accounts of those companies taking no
risk and making little, if any investment. No railway in
the world makes a profit. Pretending they do leaves us
all feeling worse off financially and morally.
The stations and trains of the past, the uniforms and
the signage, spoke of a deep and rich sense of public
pride. While there is no going back to a mythical
golden age through experiences like the Olympics
we proved we can produce a modern form of really
all being in it together a public good that made
everyone smile and everyone feel proud whether you
had a ticket or not. The railways should be a
permanent and daily embodiment of that public spirit.
So yes, we want a railway that works, we want it to
be efficient and as cost effective as possible, but we
also want it to make us feel good about ourselves, our
fellow passengers and our country.
The crux of the issue is that if you want a public
service railway it will require public subsidy. Passenger
revenue alone will not fund a railway that meets social,
environmental and wider economic need. So a truly
stand-alone commercial solution is untenable, unless
you ran a very small number of lines at peak hours
only. Given this, it would make sense to maximise
efficiency and value for money by retaining that
investment within the public service, without leaking
public money into private hands. If the private sector
was adding significant levels of investment, innovation
and efficiency then fair enough, but they clearly arent.
This is not to be anti-business but to recognise that
Page 5
ALL ON BOARD:
profit maximisation and the breakup of the system just

wont work for the railways. Besides, there is plenty of
good commercial expertise within railways
management, which could provide a much better
service in the right public framework.
The private is best mentality for rail is really starting to
wear thin. The public believes in large numbers that
rail should be publicly owned and run. A recent
YouGov poll for the Centre for Labour and Social
Studies found 66 per cent in favour of public
ownership of rail. The Labour Party Policy Review is
examining all the options and the Government has
seen sense by taking Network Rails debt onto the
public books. The decision to re-let the East Coast
franchise when it was more efficient and punctual
while in temporary state hands has met with
widespread opposition. It is ideology trumping
common sense.
Not-for-dividend rail
infrastructure operator
Network Rail which
receives around 80% of
the industrys public
subsidy will be nationalised
in September 2014, a
development that will
dramatically change the
industry landscape.
Its not just because privatisation and fragmentation
have failed that we need to change - but because
making rail public is the right thing to do.
system rather than seeing the money leak out to

private owners. Overnight re-integration and quick
wins like simplified fare structures could quickly
improve the travelling experience. Over the medium to
long-term investment decisions on track, trains and
stations could transform the railways.
Public ownership of rail also fits with the times and
goes with the grain of where societal and economic
changes are taking us.
Increasingly we live in age of movement, adaption and
flexibility. In a more dispersed and networked world
people and information are more remote from each
other and therefore have to be better connected. The
more virtual the world becomes the more we feel a
desire for physical proximity to others. Travel will be an
increasing feature of our lives. For family, friendships,
leisure and work, people are travelling more than they
ever have and would travel more if only service quality
was higher and prices lower.
Under a new public

rail system
Why a publicly
owned railway
today?
A public railway would both put right the wrongs
of the current system and help prepare Britain for
a better future.
A publicly run and accountable railway would

immediately see huge operating and cost benefits.
Over 1billion would be available for investment in the
Page 6
Integrated train, bus, tram and cycle services

would be fast, punctual, affordable, door-to-door,
clean, joyful and uplifting.
Stations could have nurseries, bike shops and
healthy local food outlets and collection points for
online shopping. Some already do because they
are community led - these need to be scaled up.
Smart cards, like Londons Oyster, could ensure
easy and cheap integration of fares across the
whole of the country.
Trains would be so good there would be little
demand for First Class carriages like the
standard class services on the Heathrow Express
and the Eurostar.
Exclusion and inequality would be systematically
tackled through pricing and the accessibility
transformation of the system.
Europe would be opened up through high-speed
networks from city to city thus reducing the
need for air travel.
Employees would be well rewarded and
motivated. They would have a strong voice to
help improve the service and the space to bring
innovation to the system.
ompass
together
for a good society
Passengers would be rail citizens people with

rights and a democratic say in what happens to a
service they own and rely on.
New track will be built and old routes reopened
so that new housing schemes would be made
viable and run down areas regenerated.
UK engineering and construction would be given
a huge boost.
Rail could become a key feature of government
counter-cyclical investment policy, providing
sustainable support for UK manufacturing jobs
and skills.
Investment could also be used to help rebalance
the national economy, to stop the South East
overheating, so that we mind the gap between
London and the rest of the country.
Finally, rail must be a central part of a sustainable
future. To make it the default travel option of
choice, to get public transport to make more
sense than using the car and the train to replace
domestic and even many short haul international
flights, trains are going to have to be fast,
comfortable, frequent and affordable. And that
includes esatblishing publicly owned rail freight to
take goods and congestion off the road
Yes it will cost, but we pay anyway one way or another

up front for an affordable and enriching experience,
that is good for jobs, our well-being and the planet, or
we pick up the bill for failure further down the track.
Taking private profit out of the equation could result in
a more affordable railway, not a more expensive one.
The next general election in May 2015 must give the
British people the chance to choose what sort of
railway system they want the same old private one
or a new public service?
It developed and delivered Oyster, still the most

ground-breaking innovation in public transport,
despite the resistance of the TOCs.
It is democratically accountability through the

Mayor and a supervisory board of stakeholders,
including passengers and the unions. This
ensures pressure to innovate and be efficient.
Train and bus passenger growth has been
integrated through regulation, managed contracts
and democratic accountability.
London Overground has benefitted from largescale investment, demonstrating the fairly obvious
argument that resources are key to making a
difference. Public ownership is a necessary step
but insufficient without investment.
Network Rail
Directly Operated Railways (DOR)
Publicly owned and

run railways work
It is not a leap of faith to demand a public railway
because the evidence suggests strongly that
publicly owned and integrated railways work best.
Transport for London (TfL)

London Underground is a publicly owned railway that
carries as many passengers as the rest of the railway
network put together. Because of its ownership and
the high level of integration it has been both efficient
and innovative:
Following the catastrophic failure of the privatised

Railtrack the creation of Network Rail created
stability on the railway and its Not for Dividend
status has ensured all money that goes to
Network Rail is invested in the railway.
Network Rails decision to take maintenance back
in-house following the demise of Railtrack,
removed the fragmentation and privatisation of rail
maintenance and led to 400m a year savings
according to the McNulty Report.
East Coast Mainline shows whats possible

through public ownership. Since the failure of the
last private company it was taken back into public
ownership. Since then East Coast has received
0.46 of government funding per passenger mile,
compared to 4.57 on West Coast. At the same
time, East Coast returns the highest level of
premium back to the government. Since 2009, it
has returned over 600m to the government. This
is over 200m more than Virgin on West Coast
and over 230m more than National Express paid
while it was running the East Coast service. It also
receives far less in indirect subsidy through
Network Grant than West Coast.
East Coast also shows that performance and
customer service can be improved by a publicly
owned railway:
o Since beginning of 2011/12 East Coast
Mainline has been the recipient of 35 industry
awards.
Page 7
ALL ON BOARD:
o
o
In the latest Passenger Focus survey East

Coast has a passenger satisfaction rating of
92%, higher than the 89% for all long
distance operators and the highest customer
satisfaction rating of any operator ever
holding the East Coast franchise.
In 2011/12 it increased passengers by 19m
(1%) and increased turnover by 4.2%,
providing premium payments of 208m to
the government.
Its punctuality in Aug /Sept 2013 was 89.4%
against a target of 87.6%
It has just recorded the highest level of
employee engagement in franchise history,
at 71% and sickness absence has been
reduced by a third since 2009 when DOR
took over.
Devolved Governments
It is interesting and important to note that both

the Welsh and Scottish governments want to
consider alternatives to rail privatisation. Both are
in the process of lobbying the Westminster
Government to change the 1993 Railways Act
which prohibits the state or an entity of the state
to permanently operate mainline railway services.
To date this has been declined by Westminster.
The Glasgow subway is publicly owned, by
Strathclyde Transport; Lothian Buses are owned
by a consortia of local authorities and makes a
considerable profit for their owners.
Northern Ireland Railways
Translink, a publicly-owned consortium which

includes buses as well as trains is the major
player and is accountable to the Northern Ireland
government. The railway is vertically-integrated
with both track and train services managed
together. Costs of infrastructure development
have been considerably lower than in Britain.
Europe
Across Europe, railways are on the whole
integrated and state owned and 30% cheaper to
run, whilst offering lower fares.
The lesson from these rail initiatives is that public

ownership is key to a modern railway network but is
an insufficient step without integration and investment.
Management needs to be focused on the public
interest and not skewed by the priority to maximise
Page 8
profits in a system that is devoid of competition.

Tesco, Sainsbury and Asda may compete in ways that
are in the interests of the shopper but rail competition
is impossible and sets up systemic conflicts between
the prime needs of shareholders and the subordinate
needs of the travelling public who have nowhere else
to go. Finally, strong local and national democracy
keeps managers and strong local and national
democracy makes managers and workers responsive
on their toes and enables the public to have a voice
and say in how the service is run. It also acts as a
safety valve if anything goes wrong.
The key principles

underpinning a
publicly-owned
railway
Taking rail back into public ownership is
technically and financially the right thing to do.
But it must be about more than what works.
A common good
Rail as a public or common good is incompatible with
private ownership. When we talk about public
ownership we need to be clear we are not talking
about old top down models, which may have met the
needs of a different kind of public in a different age.
Instead, modern public ownership must be dynamic
and responsive - a peoples railway where users and
workers are at the heart of the decision-making. It
must be run for and, wherever possible, by the public.
Public ownership means national oversight, alongside
a combination of integrated national, devolved and
regional structures with the full participation of
communities, workers and passengers.
Maximising efficiency, innovation and

responsiveness
The separation of track and wheel was always horribly
misconceived. In terms of cost and safety the
unnecessary complexity and duplication of a
fragmented rail system is now obvious. The efficiency
of integration has been demonstrated every time a
franchise fails and the operation returns to the public
sector, witness Connex and the East Coast.
ompass
together
for a good society
Competition was always a bogus form of innovation

and efficiency. A corporate monopoly simply replaced a
state monopoly. Given the reliance on public funding it
is unacceptable that the private sector should go on
enjoying such a privileged status. But we have to
ensure that public ownership is as dynamic and
accountable as possible. There are two ways of
ensuring this is the case:
First, democratic accountability through elected

national and local bodies will help ensure a better
service. The role of the directly elected London
Mayor has been instrumental in terms of ensuring
that Transport for London has been both
innovative and efficient. Although by no means
perfect, as the recent dispute over ticket office
closures has shown, there are at least the
structures to ensure that passengers interests
and the wider interests of business and the
community are taken into account and focused
onto the system. In this way accountability as the
spur to motivation and innovation comes from
within the system from the employees,
passengers and other stakeholders. Accountability
is internalised amongst those with the biggest
stake and most knowledge of the system.
Second, the direct involvement of staff and
passengers in service delivery decisions will lock
in efficiency improvements as an on-going feature
of a public rail system. The pressures of
politicians targets or competition fail miserably to
drive innovation and efficiency.iv The effects of
both soon dissipate or are gamed by
stakeholders leading to all sorts of perverse and
unintended consequences. For instance, at big
station interchanges there is no incentive for
competing operators to cooperate and risk being
fined by an overly complex contract system. With
public ownership long-term stability and reintegration could see exponentially improved
efficiency. A glimpse of the gains from the coproduction of rail services can be seen on the
East Coast service, which under direct public
ownership, now sees staff actively hand out
complaints forms to passengers so they get the
best possible feedback to improve the system.
Even the McNulty Report identifies how fragmentation

born of privatisation has prevented collaborative
approaches to passenger-focused service
improvements. To add, more recently, the outgoing
Chief Executive of the NHS, David Nicholson, has
warned that the introduction of market competition in
the NHS is acting as a barrier to collaborative
approaches to patient-oriented service configuration
and improvement. The same applies to rail.
The most significant passenger-facing innovation,
smart ticketing through the Oyster Card, was
developed and implemented in the public sector. We
need a railway that constantly improves, adapts and
responds to employee innovations, passenger needs
and new technologies. A national, integrated railway,
underpinned by a public service charter, would provide
the optimum model for designing, testing and
implementing innovative approaches to passenger
service at scale and with the investment backing of the
state.
National integration
A public service railway benefits from a national and
integrated structure of delivery and governance in
order to:
Plan and co-ordinate operations across a

complex inter-dependent and networked system
of public transport
Achieve the required economies of scale and

benefits of cross-subsidy between different parts
of the system
Ensure universal standards
Provide clear lines of vertical accountabilityv
A unfied workforce pulling together for the benefit

the whole railway
Local and devolved

While a nationally integrated system is essential,
accountability and innovation is best practiced where
people are closest to the system. Therefore, wherever
possible, decisions should be made at the lowest
possible level of the rail system to ensure the most
effective input of all stakeholders, whilst retaining the
benefits of a nationally integrated system. There are
profound issues here of investment and equity that
need to be addressed. Neither the remote state nor
the free market hold the answers and the challenge is
to find a new form of accountable public ownership
Page 9
ALL ON BOARD:
that allows the paradoxes of equality and diversity, the

local and the national, scale and participation to be
managed to best effect.
Professionalism and a public

service ethos
The railways, despite the constant meddling,
fragmentation and lack of funding, are blessed with
employees from top to bottom who are passionate
and dedicated to rail and have the wisdom and
experience to make it a world class service. Respect
for workplace rights and employees having a collective
voice in decision making should be central to a public
service railway. Employees, working within strong
governance and accountability structures, must be
empowered to take ownership of the challenges the
service faces their training, experience and
dedication must be unleashed alongside the interests
and involvement of passengers to ensure the
standards and culture of the service are constantly
improved and developed. The loss of institutional
knowledge and the benefits of its return are
summarised here:
one of the most devastating consequences of the
privatisation process was the fragmentation and loss
of industry knowledge. Running a railway making
decisions about investment, timetabling, safety,
workforce deployment requires an intimate
acquaintance with changing infrastructure conditions,
technological possibilities and service requirements
throughout the network, that in the case of British Rail
was held collectively by its workforce and managers
and brought to bear upon decision-making through
systems of cooperation and communication at all
levels of the industry.
This organisational knowledge base, never wholly
centralised and much of it effectively tacit, was
dissipated with the breakup of the industry. Many
highly skilled engineers who knew things about the
railway network that no one else did lost their jobs;
some hired that knowledge back to the industry as
private consultants. Habits of information sharing and
freely given advice were interrupted by the
requirements of commercial confidentiality. Hard-won
accumulations of local and specialised knowledge
were lost in the shift to an increasingly casualised and
individualized workforce. vi
Page 10
The collective nature of the old nationalised rail should

not be under-estimated as an asset. Privatisation
brought with it damaging competition between
workers of different companies, often with negative
impacts for passengers, with workers instructed not to
handle passengers or goods from rival companies.
This was also reflected in the growing blame culture in
the railways, most notably between Network Rail and
various TOCs over delay attribution and seen most
evidently in the wake of significant episodes such as
the Potters Bar disaster. Many delays are caused by
competing companies going through the same station
with incentives not to do what is right for passengers
but what reduces fines in a complex legal structure
not a common sense structure.
Sustainability
Our climate is undergoing clear and rapid change.
The overwhelming scientific opinion is that this change
is driven by human beings. Sea ice is melting and the
permafrost is thawing in the Arctic, coral reefs in the
ocean are being killed. We are encountering more heat
waves, heavy rains and climate related disasters.
The Intergovernmental Panel (IPCC) on Climate
Change recently published the Fifth Assessment
Report and has told the world yet again that climate
change is a huge risk we must tackle. What is new is
the clarity and urgency of the message. This report
warns that governments are set to crash through the
global CO2 safety threshold by 2030. Humans have
tripled CO2 emissions since 1970 and emissions
continue to increase.
The IPPC suggests that For all economies, especially
those with high rates of urban growth, investment in
public transport systems and lowcarbon
infrastructure can avoid locking to carbonintensive
modes. .... Mitigation strategies, when associated with
nonclimate policies at all government levels, can help
decouple transport greenhouse gas emissions from
economic growth in all regionsand thereby
dramatically reduce such emissions.vii
The transport sector accounts for 27% of final energy
use and 85% of global CO2 transport emissions come
from cars, planes and trucks.viii Planes produce eight
to eleven times the CO2 of high speed rail and lorries
emit about six times more CO2 than trains for every
ton of freight carried.
ompass
together
Cars
Trucks
Planes
Shipping
Buses
Rail
2-wheelers
for a good society
45%
25%
12%
10%
6%
1%
1%
GLOBAL EMISSIONS OF CO2 FROM TRANSPORT
A shift to buses and trains would cut transport CO2

emissions by 80%. The IPPC also makes the case for
a modal shift to rail freight: If growth in global truck
travel between 2010 and 2050 could be cut by half
from the projected 70% and shifted to expanded rail
systems, about a 20% reduction in fuel demand and
CO2 could be achieved, with only about a fifth of these
savings being offset by increased rail energy use (IEA,
2009). The European Commission (EC) set an
ambitious target of having all freight movements using
rail or waterborne modes over distances greater than
300 km by 2030, leading to major changes in modal
shares (Figure 8.8) (Tavasszy and Meijeren, 2011; EC,
2013). ix
Rail must be at the heart of our countrys concerted
attempt to stop runaway climate change. Getting
people out of cars and onto a properly integrated
public transport system that provides affordable,
enjoyable, door-to-door services is a big part of a
future in which we can all breathe clean air and avoid
climate chaos. So is getting people off domestic flights,
and even many international flights, because rail is both
a feasible and desirable alternative.x
cost and investment decisions. As has been made

clear, the farebox will never cover the capital costs of
rail investment.
It is not just passengers who benefit from an affordable
rail system everyone in the country depends on it,
even if they never travel by rail, because other people
and services that they do rely on have to use the rail
network. Just as we all benefit from the education
system, even if we dont have children. This is why rail
has to be funded to a reasonable extent out of general
taxation. The fairness argument must be won on the
basis of the public service railway underpinned by
public subsidy for fares being conditional on a set of
public service objectives with clearly defined benefits
for the whole of the UK and its population. Prices
could follow an RPI x% formula where social need
would be determined in relation to the objectives of a
charter (see below) with a significant subsidy justified
through reference to the social and environmental
objectives of the railway.
Google is busy building its UK headquarters just at the
back of Kings Cross station. Why? Because it is a
fantastic transport hub that connects to the rest of the
UK and Europe and through public investment is
becoming a highly desirable place to live and work. But
Google is regularly slated by the Public Accounts
Committee for paying little, if any, UK tax. It wants the
benefits of our rail infrastructure but doesnt want to
pay anything for it. Companies like Google and many
others, such as private home owners, benefit
massively from public rail investment and we should
look at ways in which their windfall is taxed and
redistributed to the wider community, not least through
cheaper rail fares and greater investment.
Fairness
Last but not least, travelling by rail cannot just be for
the members of the public or businesses who can
afford it. Prices are too high, too often. While so many
are unemployed or experiencing flatling or falling
wages, regular access to public transport for many is
becoming unacceptably restricted. Even for those who
can afford to travel the number of work and leisure
related journeys are being cut. Pricing should reflect
the need for the service and not ability to pay. This is
why public transport must be publicly owned and run
for all. If rail is to be a truly public service then fares
must be priced on a social basis and decoupled from
Page 11
ALL ON BOARD:
Supervisory
A new model for

Britains railway and
the key steps
towards it
Board
key stakeholders
Executive
Board
which reports to
Railways are complex entities and governance

structures need to match this complexity. As
already discussed we need to match the
requirement for national integration and long term
planning with accountability at all levels and local
diversity and innovation. This is the key paradox of
the rail system i.e. a problem that cannot be fully
solved because both the national element and the
local element are essential. The answer is not to
prioritise one over the other but to ensure a
structure which allows both to breathe and have
influence.
Nationally unified
The influential Rebuilding Rail reportxi talks about a
guiding mind for rail, with powers and responsibility
over the railways as a whole to provide strategic and
long-term direction. This is an essential step.
The broad structure of this guiding mind new
National Rail body would be:
A Supervisory Board of key stakeholders

(government, passengers, workers, businesses,
regional, special interest etc) overseeing an;
An Executive Board, to which reports;
A Networks Division and Operational Division

and;
An Access Charges Division which sets the

price of using the network but is operationally
separated from the rest of the system to ensure
transparency and fairness.
The level of accountability and democracy present on
such a national body will need careful consideration
the German model of a two-tier board, supervisory
and executive, looks like the most relevant model as
long as there were elections for stakeholder
representation.
Page 12
Networks
&
Operational
Division
Access
Changes
Division
Local diversity
However, any innovative and responsive system must,
wherever possible, be devolved and localised to allow
for the maximum possible stakeholder influence. The
relationship between regional and local interests and a
national guiding mind for the railways has to be
carefully thought through. For instance, there will be
different interests in terms of timetables and resources.
A structure and culture will need to be devised that
helps deliver a consensus between local and national
needs. This would entail:
Representation of regional/local rail interests on

the new National Rail Supervisory Board
Funding for regional rail services to be directed

via regional transport authorities
Legally enshrined powers would enable regional

transport authorities to negotiate a fair deal - with
recourse to parliament
This would be an opportunity to think afresh about
more radical forms of democracy and engagement
within a publicly owned system. The rise of directly
elected mayors and the emergence of strong cities
and city regions, particularly in the north, could
provide the democratic basis for new local and
regional transport bodies. Meanwhile public input to
local railways through Community Rail Partnerships
ompass
together
for a good society
has re-energised many branch lines, demonstrating the

huge value of genuine stakeholder involvement. Britain
is not the country it was in 1993 when rail was
privatized. Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, London
and places like Merseyside have had more than a taste
of devolution and an increasing numbers of places will
rightly want it too. Smaller tight knit operations have
successfully delivered, not least because they have
been linked to devolved governance. The new system
cannot mean a return to the old state monolith.
A Public Charter for

the Railways
This could be a set of principles, objectives and
deliverables that would define the public service
railway. It would incorporate the key objectives of
efficiency, value for money, passenger interests and
passenger voice, supporting economic growth,
connectivity, access and mobility, public safety and
security, tackling exclusion and supporting
environmental / sustainability targets. These would
form the criteria which any subsequent regulation or
evaluation of the railways would use. This would be the
guiding document that would explicitly spell out the
public service ethos of the railways. It could form the
basis of a compact for the railways that for the
necessary public subsidy there would be a
corresponding set of public service objectives. The
Public Charter for the Railways would be renewed
every ten years around a funding agreement with the
Treasury to ensure long-term investment certainty and
sustainability.
The steps towards

public ownership
The next government would announce that the

railways are to be taken back into public ownership as
each franchise expires. This way there would be little if
any cost to the Treasury.
End dates for passenger Rail Franchises

See illustration on page 15
Conclusions
At the next election Britain has the chance to put right
a great wrong. Innovation, enterprise and investment in
rail have been stifled for too long. It costs about three
times as much to run our railways now compared to
before privatisation. Enough is enough. There is a
gowing consensus that rail should be publilcy owned,
re-integrated and democratised nationally and locally.
That consensus needs to be galvanised and focused in
the months leading up to that election. It would be a
national tragedy if the opportunity to make Britains
railways the best in the world, was missed. We can do
so much better than the service we currently endure
its time we did.
Page 13
ALL ON BOARD:
References:
Jean Shoal 2004, Renaissance delayed, New Labour and

the Railways
vi
Net subsidy figures show all bar one of the TOCs are
recipients of net public funding. See TUC press release:
http://www.tuc.org.uk/industrial-issues/transport-policy/trainoperators-gained-%C2%A327bn-taxpayers-subsidy-last-year
and ORR report GB Rail Financial Information 2012:
http://www.rail-reg.gov.uk/upload/pdf/gb-financials-2012.pdf
i
ii
See Rebuilding Rail report
See
http://report.mitigation2014.org/spm/ipcc_wg3_ar5_summary
-for-policymakers_approved.pdf
vii
viii
For sources see the One Million Climate Jobs Now!
pamphlet and Jonathan Neales book Stop Global WarmingChange the World.
See the full report;

http://report.mitigation2014.org/drafts/final-draftpostplenary/ipcc_wg3_ar5_finaldraft_postplenary_chapter8.pdf
ix
See CRESC report the conceit of enterprise for profiteering

figures, using ROCE (return on capital employed), astonishing
rates of return to Virgin and others, compared to
supermarkets:
http://www.cresc.ac.uk/sites/default/files/The%20Conceit%2
0of%20Enterprise.pdf
iii
See http://www.justeconomics.co.uk/rmt-report/ for more

on efficiency and public ownership
iv
See
http://www.deutschebahn.com/file/3020438/data/studie_inte
grierte_bahnen.pdf for more information
Page 14
See
http://www.uic.org/homepage/railways_and_the_environment
09.pdf for more info
x
See
http://www.transportforqualityoflife.com/u/files/120630_Rebui
lding_Rail_Final_Report_print_version.pdf
xi
ompass
together
for a good society
End dates for passenger Rail Franchises
Page 15
May 2014
ALL ON BOARD:
To join Compass visit

http://www.compassonline.org.uk/join/
Southbank House,
Black Prince Road
London SE1 7SJ
T: +44 (0) 207 463 0633
E: [email protected]

Compass - All On Board

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Compass - All On Board

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Compass - All On Board

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

ALL ON BOARD

A PUBLICLY OW NED RAILWAY

for a good society