RDG/NR must now step up

Great leaders do not merely seek consensus. They shape it.

It’s maybe the expected choice for me to talk here about drivers union ASLEF’s settlement of the long dispute with Southern, regarding door control and replacing the guard with the modern role of On Board Supervisor.

But I’m not going to write about that. Yes, it’s important and has caused huge misery for millions of people, but it is extensively covered in the following pages and I’m going to let the dust settle somewhat before revisiting the issue. The toxicity continues, sadly, with howls of protest and harsh attacks from RMT members/supporters (including some campaigners) over ASLEF’s ballot to settle the dispute. Drivers are accused of ‘selling out’ and ‘not caring about safety’ on Southern. But the drivers’ decisive 80% vote to settle was clear.

Consequently, the argument - which had been moving in this direction for some time - has now focused on universal access for less able passengers, and this is generating far more heat than light. Angry campaigners, incensed by anecdotal claims that ‘lots’ of wheelchair passengers are routinely being left behind on platforms or are having to be man-handled out of trains by other passengers, because of OBS absences, are shouting very loudly. If they are correct, then their anger is justified and Southern must be taken to task and compelled to get its house in order. RAIL is looking into this in some detail - watch this space.

I talked in the last issue about the Rail Delivery Group’s ‘one railway’ initiative, which aims to promote widespread change across the railway in ways which underpin greater integration within devolved management, putting passenger and freight customers truly at the heart of all activity. It is now incumbent on RDG members to deliver on the four commitments, launched at St Pancras International on October 30. I hope this launch was a watershed and not a sink hole.

More widely, however, ‘one railway’ needs to apply not just externally, but internally, too. Back in May/June I wrote two Comments - DfT and NR need to step up and Reshaping NR in a new form. Both are in the ‘Research Hub’ section at railmagazine.com. In each, I talked about the need for a ‘guiding mind’ for the railway - and I believe that the need for this is increasing in urgency, by the day.

In a rare moment of agreement, both Wolmar and I concluded that the devolving NR is the right place for this to be. I am increasingly convinced that this is indeed the right answer - but the big problem is the clear (nay, vehement!) objections to this, not least among train operators. They are right to be concerned. Back in Strategic Rail Authority days, its chairman and chief executive Richard Bowker rejected any idea of the infrastructure owner taking a leading role. “Put the factory in charge,” he’d say “and it will do what’s right for the factory.”

I understand his point, but back then the SRA was ‘in charge’ of strategic planning, charged with bringing all constituencies together to create what it called ‘Everyone’s Railway’. But there has been no SRA since its abolition by Secretary of State Alastair Darling in the 2004 Rail Review, and since then there has been a vacuum in terms of national strategic thinking. There is no national plan for enhancements or train cascades. No co-ordinated national timetable thinking. No sense of a properly planned network in strategic terms. Indeed, it’s worse than that - not only is there no strategic thinking, we’ve had precious little of even the most basic co-ordination.

This was laid horribly bare earlier this year in the Gibb Report into the mega Thameslink Southern Great Northern franchise. The three franchises making up TSGN had three separate sets of conflicting, largely empty London night trains. This was not only wasteful in terms of train use and crew costs, these ghost trains denied NR maintenance engineers access to the track. It also led to thousands of miles of after-hours unproductive empty stock working to get the trains back to depots for servicing and inspection. Incredibly, when the new franchise was drawn up, these services were baked into the specification, meaning the TOC was compelled to run them! It was madness.

Also, during the morning peak, congestion on lines through London Bridge in particular meant that the timetable was literally impossible to deliver. This led to poor performance, perpetual late running and ongoing massive reputional damage for the railway.

There can be no more basic measure of a railway’s network status than the provision of a robust, effective timetable which is the product of transparent capacity planning. Such a timetable would be based on open and evenhanded use of detailed industry data. The transparency of this data would make sure that the consequences of every decision could be objectively measured against the risks of doing something else - or doing nothing at all.

Given Bowker’s ‘factory’ comment, it’s clear why train operators in particular would be at the very least wary, but more probably suspicious or (more likely still) dead against NR assuming such responsibilities, as basic as they are. We are, at this stage, only talking about timetables and capacity management. Franchise bidders would doubtless be suspicious about ‘showing their hand’ by running proposals through this data to check if their plans were deliverable. Yet if we genuinely believe in customer focus, subjecting franchise proposals to a reality check should be welcomed? Likewise Government. In drawing up ITT specifications, DfT could likewise carry out a reality check on its own proposals.

This would produce a genuinely robust service for which taxpayers and passengers pay. The obstacles to even this basic level of co- operation are significant - but NR, DfT and RDG need to take a mature approach and overcome those obstacles. NR would need to work very hard to overcome its reputation of being very difficult and slow to work with.

Bluntly, where else can this responsibility sit? The sooner we all deal with that, take a mature approach and really get on with it, the sooner we’ll make long overdue progress.

NR’s emerging system operator, led by the very experienced Jo Kaye, seems to me to be moving in precisely this direction. For it to succeed in even this most basic co-ordination outcome, however, NR will need to show flexibility, humility and a much sharper approach. Owning groups will need to be much more openly collaborative, while Government will need to just back off and allow itself to be guided by the industry’s very considerable expertise. This will enhance value for all. All these constituents should be represented within the new system operator, with its own independent chairman. This ‘co-ordinating mind’ could facilitate real progress. Or we carry on as we are and allow increasing public distrust to fuel the Nationalisation argument.

Sure, there are indeed risks in doing this. But not doing it carries much greater risk.

“The obstacles... are significant - but NR, DfT and RDG need to take a mature approach and overcome those obstacles ”