Railway strikes?

[Sly]

Public sector I get - they’ve been cut to the bone in places. However you can’t win, in order to fund everything, we’ll need to make cuts elsewhere or raise taxation. It’s a whole other argument on where we waste money within the private sector. 

Private companies, I stand by what I said, they’re running a business to make money. How much money they want to make, is up to the owners of that company. Some may rightly or wrongly see that as being greedy. Ultimately if you work for a private company, the reality is that you work for the owner/s of that business. If they decide to change your terms of contractual conditions, you don’t need to accept it and they have the option of making you redundant. It’s the harsh reality.
 

Every job has a going rate, that salary and related perks fluctuate over time, typically linked to worker and skill set availability. 

[Raj]

41 minutes ago, ozleicester said:

"Its the workers fault"

This is the scary thing that people actually believe this.

This Government  can literally do what they want, theyve made this country into a third world mess yet when workers want better conditions, some folk believe they should just put up, shut up or get a new job.

Its unbelievable  but scary too

[Greg2607]

Worry more about the bill currently going through parliament which will effectively remove the right to pay equality, paid holidays, paid maternity leave, maximum working week etc....

 

that's potentially what's coming down the road and no doubt, unscrupulous employers will take massive advantage of those most in need of work. 

[CosbehFox]

32 minutes ago, Sly said:

Public sector I get - they’ve been cut to the bone in places. However you can’t win, in order to fund everything, we’ll need to make cuts elsewhere or raise taxation. It’s a whole other argument on where we waste money within the private sector. 

Private companies, I stand by what I said, they’re running a business to make money. How much money they want to make, is up to the owners of that company. Some may rightly or wrongly see that as being greedy. Ultimately if you work for a private company, the reality is that you work for the owner/s of that business. If they decide to change your terms of contractual conditions, you don’t need to accept it and they have the option of making you redundant. It’s the harsh reality.
 

Every job has a going rate, that salary and related perks fluctuate over time, typically linked to worker and skill set availability. 

Which is way a lot of people are being misrepresented in this situation. Four of the main train franchises are publicly owned and a good percentage of the striking staff are contracted to Network Rail. NR is of course solely owned by the British govt and then charges the individual franchises. It’s a bona fide public service. Hence there’s a lot of taxpayers money being debated here. 
 

And subsequently the contracts they are employed under originate from the old British Rail days. Which is the unique link with most of the strikers at the moment - they are public services which have been made semi private. In my view using profits to pay shareholders as opposed to keep the staff in line with market rates. They legally couldn’t change their T and Cs when they went private
 

There’s nothing to stop us aligning with how Europe operates their train services or post service. But you know we are what we are. 

[grobyfox1990]

2 hours ago, Sly said:

Public sector I get - they’ve been cut to the bone in places. However you can’t win, in order to fund everything, we’ll need to make cuts elsewhere or raise taxation. It’s a whole other argument on where we waste money within the private sector. 

Private companies, I stand by what I said, they’re running a business to make money. How much money they want to make, is up to the owners of that company. Some may rightly or wrongly see that as being greedy. Ultimately if you work for a private company, the reality is that you work for the owner/s of that business. If they decide to change your terms of contractual conditions, you don’t need to accept it and they have the option of making you redundant. It’s the harsh reality.
 

Every job has a going rate, that salary and related perks fluctuate over time, typically linked to worker and skill set availability. 

In theory I agree with you as I’m a capitalist at heart. I work in reality though so what you’re describing just doesn’t happen. In reality however I’d love it if my team was like you, I’d run all over the motherf4ckers and work them to the bone 

[marbles]

14 hours ago, grobyfox1990 said:

In theory I agree with you as I’m a capitalist at heart. I work in reality though so what you’re describing just doesn’t happen. In reality however I’d love it if my team was like you, I’d run all over the motherf4ckers and work them to the bone 

Perhaps you could hire Sly

[Leicester_Loyal]

Network Rail have put the same offer that was rejected a few weeks back, back to the RMT and said this is the offer

 

The managing director for some of the routes was on the news this morning saying the union members didn't understand what they were voting for

[Eurofox]

Privatisation of everything has led to this mess...

Give em a fair wage & take it from the shareholders 

[BenTheFox]

17 hours ago, Eurofox said:

Privatisation of everything has led to this mess...

Give em a fair wage & take it from the shareholders 

I think it's very telling that even Margaret Thatcher wouldn't privatise the railways. It's been a complete disaster. 

[Greg2607]

living in North West Leicestershire, I can't say it's ever really impacted me...

 

We are certainly a poor cousin when it comes to ANY kind of public transport, but given that we don't have a single train station in the area, train travel just doesn't register as a thought process for me for local journeys or otherwise. 

[Dames]

On 29/12/2022 at 18:12, Bordersfox said:

Well said! 

 

Perhaps we should remove all of the employment rights and not to mention basic health and safety legislation that's been largely passed because of union action and see then whether people think unions are a good or bad thing. 

 

You only have to look at what happens in a country like Qatar where employees have no rights, particularly in hazardous jobs like construction or factory work.  People die.  

A lot of people in this country would like to see things go that way. A good chunk of them are sitting MPs too. 

[CosbehFox]

1 hour ago, BenTheFox said:

I think it's very telling that even Margaret Thatcher wouldn't privatise the railways. It's been a complete disaster. 

Thatcher quickly agreed a deal with nurses after they striked realising the public perspection. 
 

Sunak is waffling on about maths today 

[Bordersfox]

1 hour ago, CosbehFox said:

Thatcher quickly agreed a deal with nurses after they striked realising the public perspection. 
 

Sunak is waffling on about maths today 

Classic rollocks and distraction (of which politicians of all stripes are guilty).  

 

Maths a Tory favourite.  Sounds good and solid.  Make everyone do more maths, it will solve everything.  None of your airy fairy humanities.

[Mythyaar]

All for workers rights to strike and earn a fair wage for a fair day's work. It's their prerogative and should be respected.

However, this strike is not all about pay. It's also about conditions and future working patterns. These include driverless trains. Siemens are building a lot of them at the moment to service the likes of Paris, Barcelona, Tokyo etc. There have been no safety incidents as far as I'm aware, as a result of the driverless trains.

 

Unfortunately, the bi product of this development/ progression is that fewer staff are required to man the trains. This is a red line for Mick Lynch. Furthermore, he probably feels emboldened to persist with the demand that all trains are manned with guards (for safety reasons) due to Merseyrail's decision to capitulate on the matter last year (or the year before).

 

For me, driverless trains are the future. Manning needs to be reduced - staff can be relocated to other areas within the business or there may be natural redundancies or a few forced ones. But regardless of if the franchise goes back into the public sector, which I believe it should, along with all the energy providers, we cannot stand in the way of progress and use the dubious excuse of safety for doing so.  

[Finnaldo]

32 minutes ago, Mythyaar said:

All for workers rights to strike and earn a fair wage for a fair day's work. It's their prerogative and should be respected.

However, this strike is not all about pay. It's also about conditions and future working patterns. These include driverless trains. Siemens are building a lot of them at the moment to service the likes of Paris, Barcelona, Tokyo etc. There have been no safety incidents as far as I'm aware, as a result of the driverless trains.

 

Unfortunately, the bi product of this development/ progression is that fewer staff are required to man the trains. This is a red line for Mick Lynch. Furthermore, he probably feels emboldened to persist with the demand that all trains are manned with guards (for safety reasons) due to Merseyrail's decision to capitulate on the matter last year (or the year before).

 

For me, driverless trains are the future. Manning needs to be reduced - staff can be relocated to other areas within the business or there may be natural redundancies or a few forced ones. But regardless of if the franchise goes back into the public sector, which I believe it should, along with all the energy providers, we cannot stand in the way of progress and use the dubious excuse of safety for doing so.  

The consistent line I’ve seen from Lynch on this is that the infrastructure we have isn’t sufficient- we haven’t even electrified a lot of our lines- and can you really see the current lot pulling out the funding to make self driving trains a reality anytime soon?

[leicsmac]

2 minutes ago, Finnaldo said:

The consistent line I’ve seen from Lynch on this is that the infrastructure we have isn’t sufficient- we haven’t even electrified a lot of our lines- and can you really see the current lot pulling out the funding to make self driving trains a reality anytime soon?

Having been recently to Tokyo and also seen the UK rail system I would heartily agree with Lynch here that the infrastructure isn't anywhere near ready for driverless trains. The UK hasn't even got a true high-speed rail (as in 155mph+) line yet and there's a laundry list of OECD nations that have loads, let alone automating the tech.

[kenny]

54 minutes ago, Finnaldo said:

The consistent line I’ve seen from Lynch on this is that the infrastructure we have isn’t sufficient- we haven’t even electrified a lot of our lines- and can you really see the current lot pulling out the funding to make self driving trains a reality anytime soon?

I suspect self-driving cars will be quicker as there is less investment involved.

 

Mick Lynch's argument is flawed anyway. He doesn't want redundancies in the event of driverless trains because the lines haven't been invested yet. So what scenario does he anticipate should this happen in the next 12 months?

 

If the Tories want to 'break' the RMT, they should announce immediate upgrades to the train lines to allow for driverless trains which have shown to be safer than traditional trains in other countries.

 

 

[leicsmac]

10 minutes ago, kenny said:

I suspect self-driving cars will be quicker as there is less investment involved.

 

Mick Lynch's argument is flawed anyway. He doesn't want redundancies in the event of driverless trains because the lines haven't been invested yet. So what scenario does he anticipate should this happen in the next 12 months?

 

If the Tories want to 'break' the RMT, they should announce immediate upgrades to the train lines to allow for driverless trains which have shown to be safer than traditional trains in other countries.

 

 

To be honest this should have happened years ago. Trying it now will cost a lot of time and money, but it does have to be done sooner or later. I know I keep repeating myself but the difference in public transport infrastructure between the UK and other OECD nations of comparable size is stark.

[CosbehFox]

1 hour ago, Finnaldo said:

The consistent line I’ve seen from Lynch on this is that the infrastructure we have isn’t sufficient- we haven’t even electrified a lot of our lines- and can you really see the current lot pulling out the funding to make self driving trains a reality anytime soon?

Exactly it’s a nonsense excuse turned out by govt/NR/the rail companies.
 

I actually think RMT would be willing take the notion of closed ticket offices and less guards if the maintenance/engineering staff was kept in place. 

[CosbehFox]

24 minutes ago, kenny said:

I suspect self-driving cars will be quicker as there is less investment involved.

 

Mick Lynch's argument is flawed anyway. He doesn't want redundancies in the event of driverless trains because the lines haven't been invested yet. So what scenario does he anticipate should this happen in the next 12 months?

 

If the Tories want to 'break' the RMT, they should announce immediate upgrades to the train lines to allow for driverless trains which have shown to be safer than traditional trains in other countries.

 

 

To be fair, would anyone have an issue if the profits made by NR and the rail companies were invested this way? Probably not. The reality is the profits aren’t used that way and hence the arguments. 

[Daggers]

I'm surprised the privatisation party isn't hoiking the idea of private trains.

 

Rock up to the station and hire-drive your own train to your destination. It'd be a roaring success just like all utility privatisations and do away with those pesky train drivers. App developers would boost the economy with new apps for train sat navs and the train police could make a killing fining everyone speeding in their trains or parking them badly.

 

If any Tory MPs are reading this, I've a ton of other great ideas like this that you could include in your next manifesto for a very reasonable fee.

Edited 4 January 2023 by Daggers

[kenny]

1 hour ago, CosbehFox said:

To be fair, would anyone have an issue if the profits made by NR and the rail companies were invested this way? Probably not. The reality is the profits aren’t used that way and hence the arguments. 

Network Rail make around 3% profit currently. (Around £300 million)

 

This is a fairly poor profit margin I would suggest.

 

What no one knows is whether Network Rail in public ownership would achieve the same spenditure figures. If it performs exactly the same, then the public will be £300m better off by it being in public ownership.

 

If it doesn't, then the public could be considerably worse off.

[CosbehFox]

10 minutes ago, kenny said:

Network Rail make around 3% profit currently. (Around £300 million)

 

This is a fairly poor profit margin I would suggest.

 

What no one knows is whether Network Rail in public ownership would achieve the same spenditure figures. If it performs exactly the same, then the public will be £300m better off by it being in public ownership.

 

If it doesn't, then the public could be considerably worse off.

The previous year it made £1.6bn.
 

The reasoning for the drop in profit was the payouts which occur on the bond scheme to service the debt that the Network Rail incurred as it privatised.
 

I look at SNCF in France, they made a profits approx of 1.8% on last years accounts and that’s the complete running of the railways including services and outside investments elsewhere. All going back into the public pot 
 

 

 

 

[grobyfox1990]

45 minutes ago, kenny said:

Network Rail make around 3% profit currently. (Around £300 million)

 

This is a fairly poor profit margin I would suggest.

 

What no one knows is whether Network Rail in public ownership would achieve the same spenditure figures. If it performs exactly the same, then the public will be £300m better off by it being in public ownership.

 

If it doesn't, then the public could be considerably worse off.

But much like the energy companies, is this profit after various 'charges' and 'management fees' ? I'm asking btw not telling, if they're making a 3% margin my god they're worse than we all thought

Edited 4 January 2023 by grobyfox1990
typo

[kenny]

14 minutes ago, grobyfox1990 said:

But much like the energy companies, is this profit after various 'charges' and 'management fees' ? I'm asking btw not telling, if they're making a 3% margin my god they're worse than we all thought

That will be their declared profit after Chief Exec salaries etc.

 

The numbers sound large for these former public companies but as percentages are pretty rubbish.

 

https://www.sharesmagazine.co.uk/news/market/LSE20220719124150_4445301/network-rail-limited-annual-report-accounts-2022

 

The balance sheet shows the previously higher profits @CosbehFox highlighted.

 

I suspect the reduction the use of the railways will mean the profits will remain low in the future and will only get worse with the strikes.

 

I think we are due for some re-nationalisation to remind everyone how poor it was previously. So in my mind, lets just put those who like the idea of Britsh Rail again out of their misery.