Should we nationalise the railways?

[BDunnell]

Well call it what you will, they are not in government hands anyway.

I call it privatisation, seeing as that's what it's always been (correctly) called according to any sensible definition.

[anthonyvop]

Tony, the simple fact is that they were privatised. You can't re-write history and say they were not. The operation of rail services was transferred from a state-owned company to private ones.

No. Nominal control was transferred to private companies. Until the companies can decided for themselves who they serve and with what kind of service they will just be companies providing a service for the Government not the public.

[anthonyvop]

Well call it what you will, they are not in government hands anyway.

If they are under Government control then they are not in any way, shape or form a privately controlled entity. So the Railways in the UK have not been privatized.

[BDunnell]

If they are under Government control then they are not in any way, shape or form a privately controlled entity. So the Railways in the UK have not been privatized.

Tony, you are plain wrong. The British railways were privatised. End of story. You are, with respect, not better informed on this than the many industry experts (you know what one of those is?) who refer to it as, wait for it, 'rail privatisation'. At the time, the Conservative government proclaimed it to be privatisation. How else would one describe a situation in which the running of trains is passed from a state-owned operator to private operators? You may think you know people better than they know themselves, but on this you are simply mistaken.

[BDunnell]

No. Nominal control was transferred to private companies. Until the companies can decided for themselves who they serve and with what kind of service they will just be companies providing a service for the Government not the public.

Tony, this is a subject you know nothing about. What, pray tell us, is your knowledge of British rail privatisation derived from? Is it a subject about which you have read extensively?

[MrMetro]

ASLEF - Rail Privatisation


BBC NEWS | UK | UK Politics | The great train sell-off: Who dunnit?

Rail privatisation - a short history - Channel 4 News

Privatisation of British Rail

[BDunnell]

ASLEF - Rail Privatisation


BBC NEWS | UK | UK Politics | The great train sell-off: Who dunnit?

Rail privatisation - a short history - Channel 4 News

Privatisation of British Rail

One of those sources is from a union, so Tony will refuse to recognise it in any way, shape or form.

[Dave B]

They certainly were privatised, but in such a half-arsed fashion that they still require massive subsidies to operate. Nevertheless that doesn't change the fact that the railways in the UK were privatised.

[BDunnell]

They certainly were privatised, but in such a half-arsed fashion that they still require massive subsidies to operate. Nevertheless that doesn't change the fact that the railways in the UK were privatised.

Precisely.

[BDunnell]

While we are on the subject of the British railways, why do the companies involved have this obsession with 'revenue protection'? In no other country in Europe in which I have travelled by train is one confronted with ticket barriers at mainline stations, and patronising ad campaigns saying that running late and having to dash for your train is 'no excuse' for not buying a ticket beforehand, when in fact it is a perfectly good excuse. Are Britons somehow less honest than their foreign counterparts in this regard? I doubt it. The difference, as far as I can see, is that rail operators elsewhere tend to have sufficient staff to check the tickets on the train, rather than barriers being necessary.

Now in Sheffield, where the footbridge across the railway station is the only truly convenient pedestrian link into the city centre from houses on the other side of the railway tracks, the station operators have been proposing to forbid access to all but ticket-holders in an effort to clamp down on people boarding trains without tickets.

Sheffield train fare dodgers could be costing £14 million - Business - The Star

One question: if they can work out that fare-dodgers at Sheffield station 'could' (good use of the word) be costing £14 million a year in lost revenue, why can they not employ the staff presumably engaged in making those calculations to check tickets on the trains, rather than installing barriers? Or, is the figure utterly spurious?