Fit for the 21st century

On the last day of the Liberal Democrat conference in

September, the policy motion entitled Railways fit for the 21st

century was debated and passed. Participation at the conference was far and wide, from councillors and representatives of constituencies in places such as Kingston, Calderdale, Dorset, Macclesfield, Newcastle, Coventry, Witney, Wokingham and Roxborough. What they all had in common was how ‘dire’ train services are - from cancelled trains, late trains, old trains, crowded trains, inaccessible trains, increased journey times, and reductions to train service patterns.

These people and their constituents are experiencing these problems every day, and Richard Clinnick should not be so dismissive of their experiences ( Comment,

RAIL 888).

The UK does trail behind many European countries in terms of electrification. Only 42% of UK rail is electrified, versus an EU average of 54%, and with the cancellation of schemes in the North, the

Midlands and Wales, this is unlikely to change soon.

The UK similarly trails in high-speed rail, with a mere 113km (70 miles, HS1), while the Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal, Italy, Germany, France and Spain have some 8,000km (5,000 miles) between them.

Rail fares in real terms have risen by 20% since privatisation. This, taken together with wage stagnation that has meant real wages falling by 5%, with further fare rise increases in 2019 (3.2%) and planned for 2020 (2.7%), will be feeling pretty painful to a lot of people - especially when punctuality has been at a 13-yearlow and one in five people have to stand on their commute.

While in some areas of the country this has improved, on-time arrivals are 64.7% for the last 12 months ( https://dataportal.orr.gov. uk/statistics/performance/

passenger-rail-performance/), or 87% if using the historical PPM. But at some stations - Manchester, Birmingham and Bristol - over 50% of trains arrived late, and at Manchester Oxford Road only one in three trains was on time.

Compare this to driving during the same period: with the continued freezing of fuel duty and tax incentives for smaller (together with more fuel-efficient) cars, driving is actually 14% cheaper. No wonder that driving is still the most popular mode of transport.

In conclusion, Richard Clinnick suggests in his editorial that the arrival of new trains on many of these routes is going to solve many of these problems, and that the “fare-paying passenger” should be grateful.

While these new trains are to be welcomed, it should also shame the rail industry and government

that the upgraded infrastructure has not been delivered in order to let these trains run at their full line speed capacity.

The central tenet of the policy was the removal of the government from day-to-day running of the railway.

This is not a new concept, and widely expected to be a recommendation from the Williams Review. But in summation, Caroline Pidgeon (member of the London Assembly) stated that while the policy was not perfect, we “need to start somewhere”.

Johannah Randall, Director, Start-Up Rail