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Post by Orac on Mar 14, 2024 8:53:47 GMT
You are ignoring the facts in Jogs post,east coast mainline failed and the state run enterprise in the interim brought it back to how it should be but the govt refused to let them carry on running it. What use is the dogma state run is inefficient and costly so privatise it which turns out even more expensive and badly run. The water industry is a prime example billions paid to shareholders and now it’s said London and the south east will run out of drinkable water in twenty years. Well London has been trying to build a new reservoir for the past 30 years - but local politicians have been fighting to stop it. The same politicians I might add who promote open borders and mass immigration. Reservoirs take up a lot space. Where are you going to house millions of migrants if you build a working and sufficient water system? It's a matter of priorities. |
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Post by Dan Dare on Mar 14, 2024 9:03:34 GMT
But we are still massively subsidising the 50% of franchises run by the State - there has been no reduction in their subsidy or any improvement in their performance. Sorry but the idea that making the railways State run solves their problems is not supported by the evidence. I think you just have to compare the privatised rail system with the still-predominantly publicly-owned rail systems on the continent to get all the evidence you need.
By just one metric alone, percentage of track electrified, the UK's system is more like that of a third-world country than a 21st century European one.
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Post by Dan Dare on Mar 14, 2024 9:06:28 GMT
McKinstry mentions, almost in passing, the corroding effect of the 'Diversity and Inclusion' culture which has taken over not just public bodies like the NHS but private business also. What he doesn't do, however, is explain how this results in an epidemic of mediocrity as standards are lowered and squabbling over access to resources takes over the political discourse. A few examples would not have gone amiss, delivered in the Sun-reader friendly language of the rest of the piece. Yeah, nothing to do with who's been in power for the last 14 years. The present-day EDI culture is a function of legislation introduced by the Blair regime, namely the Human Rights Act, the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000 and the Equality Act. |
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Post by Pacifico on Mar 14, 2024 11:40:16 GMT
But we are still massively subsidising the 50% of franchises run by the State - there has been no reduction in their subsidy or any improvement in their performance. Sorry but the idea that making the railways State run solves their problems is not supported by the evidence. I think you just have to compare the privatised rail system with the still-predominantly publicly-owned rail systems on the continent to get all the evidence you need.
By just one metric alone, percentage of track electrified, the UK's system is more like that of a third-world country than a 21st century European one.
Indeed.. |
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Post by Fairsociety on Mar 14, 2024 11:46:24 GMT
But we are still massively subsidising the 50% of franchises run by the State - there has been no reduction in their subsidy or any improvement in their performance. Sorry but the idea that making the railways State run solves their problems is not supported by the evidence. I think you just have to compare the privatised rail system with the still-predominantly publicly-owned rail systems on the continent to get all the evidence you need.
By just one metric alone, percentage of track electrified, the UK's system is more like that of a third-world country than a 21st century European one.
Why do you think that is Dan?, maybe because it's all about profits-shareholders-lack of investment, what do you expect when all shareholders want to do is take take take, they know it would cost Billions to bring them up to scratch, and they will have the audacity for tax payer funded grants to fix it. |
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Post by Dan Dare on Mar 14, 2024 11:58:20 GMT
I think you just have to compare the privatised rail system with the still-predominantly publicly-owned rail systems on the continent to get all the evidence you need.
By just one metric alone, percentage of track electrified, the UK's system is more like that of a third-world country than a 21st century European one.
Indeed.. It's all relative.
Germans are notoriously fussy and have expectations of public services that are stratospheric compared to those prevailing in the UK.
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Post by Dan Dare on Mar 14, 2024 12:05:54 GMT
I think you just have to compare the privatised rail system with the still-predominantly publicly-owned rail systems on the continent to get all the evidence you need.
By just one metric alone, percentage of track electrified, the UK's system is more like that of a third-world country than a 21st century European one.
Why do you think that is Dan?, maybe because it's all about profits-shareholders-lack of investment, what do you expect when all shareholders want to do is take take take, they know it would cost Billions to bring them up to scratch, and they will have the audacity for tax payer funded grants to fix it. My own view is that the UK took a wrong turn in the 1950s and 1960s by replacing steam traction with diesel, except for a very few mainlines. There are still many mainlines which are not electrified, including the Transpennine between Manchester and Leeds, and everything on the western region west of Bristol, not to mention everywhere in Scotland north of Edinburgh. Much of the network is still only single-track. Felixstowe, for example, the largest port in the UK is connected via a single-track branchline (Unelectrified). It's simply a lack of vision and an obsessive concern about 'value for money'.
The major continental systems, on the other hand, invested heavily in electrification, from which they are reaping the benefit today.
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Post by jonksy on Mar 14, 2024 18:02:47 GMT
Labour started it by telling parents they were no longer allowed to discipline their children because they thought parents were unable to differentiate between chastisement and corporal punishment, hence they created entitled monsters who cannot take criticism and who feel the world owes them , and that everything they want will be provided by ther doting parents or just fall into their laps with zero effort from them. Generation TikTok's belief in their right to do nothing is ruining our economy. The government created this problem, now they must fix it writes HUGH OSMOND...... While it is dangerous to read too much into what is trending on social media, I was taken aback just the other day to see a thread on TikTok in which young people joked to their thousands of followers about their life on benefits. In one video, captioned ‘What life is like living off the dole’, a young man walks through a shopping centre boasting that he is going to spend the day ‘drinking and smoking cigarettes in a public park at 2pm in the afternoon, which I am quite excited to do’. www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13194251/Ministers-created-world-young-people-boast-TikTok-life-benefits-fix-writes-HUGH-OSMOND.html |
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Post by patman post on Mar 14, 2024 18:31:28 GMT
Public transport in the North is appaling, in my family no one uses trains any more because the service is just so bad. We would buy tickets to get from A to B and then suddenly, out of the blue ... this service is terminating at Huddersfield, and buses are provided to complete your journey. Other times, services just dont turn up, or they are suddenly cancelled, we have had to get taxi's to take us 50 miles because the last train of the day is suddenly withdrawn. Buses are not much better, only last week a family member bought a MegaBus ticket from Middlesbrough to Newcastle, the service was delayed for two hours, meaning they would miss connections to the Airport ( another taxi £75.00 ). Privatization and deregulation ... what a disaster, back in the 70s and 80s we had one bus company which operated all services in the area, "Late" or "Cancelled" was unheard of, it just didn't happen. Totally agree , Living in London is OK with 24 hour buses and the trains are regular enough to not get too stressed about the odd cancellation . But feck me try and get home from just a few miles outside and it always goes tits .The third from last bus is often actually the last one and thats before the sun has even set from some places . For anyone living permanently in middle earth you have my sympathies Public transport in London is good — mainly driven by the political aim of getting private vehicles down. That didn’t work, so the anti-car lobby have persuaded councils to block many roads to traffic. That’ll probably work given time, but most of the real community and locality life of London’s different areas will have been destroyed by Green bureaucracy. As a pointer to Sadiq and his enthusiastic green and anti wealth followers, ALL public transport in Luxembourg is free. The aim was to reduce private road traffic. Last time I was there it looked like there were more cars than ever, so I reckon that worked well… |
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Post by Totheleft on Mar 15, 2024 3:29:17 GMT
I think you just have to compare the privatised rail system with the still-predominantly publicly-owned rail systems on the continent to get all the evidence you need.
By just one metric alone, percentage of track electrified, the UK's system is more like that of a third-world country than a 21st century European one.
Why do you think that is Dan?, maybe because it's all about profits-shareholders-lack of investment, what do you expect when all shareholders want to do is take take take, they know it would cost Billions to bring them up to scratch, and they will have the audacity for tax payer funded grants to fix it. So you. Support state owed business. You riff raff you. |
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Post by Dogburger on Mar 15, 2024 7:40:43 GMT
Totally agree , Living in London is OK with 24 hour buses and the trains are regular enough to not get too stressed about the odd cancellation . But feck me try and get home from just a few miles outside and it always goes tits .The third from last bus is often actually the last one and thats before the sun has even set from some places . For anyone living permanently in middle earth you have my sympathies Public transport in London is good — mainly driven by the political aim of getting private vehicles down. That didn’t work, so the anti-car lobby have persuaded councils to block many roads to traffic. That’ll probably work given time, but most of the real community and locality life of London’s different areas will have been destroyed by Green bureaucracy. As a pointer to Sadiq and his enthusiastic green and anti wealth followers, ALL public transport in Luxembourg is free. The aim was to reduce private road traffic. Last time I was there it looked like there were more cars than ever, so I reckon that worked well… Talking about blocking side roads and making car drivers keep to the congested main drag there was an accident just the other day down the high street .Last year it would have been simple diversion to avoid but now there is nowhere to go and its a matter of sit and wait . I wouldn't say public transport is good ,its OK that you can get from A to B . Its dirty and congested , used by freeloaders and social deviants ,the fear of crime is also an issue especially at night and why many still use their own cars , even 'free' wouldn't change that |
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Post by Dogburger on Mar 15, 2024 8:11:43 GMT
It's all relative.
Germans are notoriously fussy and have expectations of public services that are stratospheric compared to those prevailing in the UK.
From my time when living in Germany its not the investment in its transport that stands out one way or another but its organisation . Like when you get off a train you don't have to wait 45 minutes for the connection or the bus to where you live . All the transport just seemed interwoven and journeys were seamless , and on time . Its a real gripe of mine locally , if on time (lol) the train out of central London pulls into the local station at 20 and 50 minutes past the hour . The bus up the hill passes the station two minutes before .The service doesn't even start till gone 7am so its no good at all for going to work . It's just fecking maddening . What compounds it is that they got planning for a load of flats without parking spaces near me on the back of Khans London plan that they have access to public transport within so many yards . Planting a bus stop in the ground doesn't mean you have access to public transport  |
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Post by johnofgwent on Mar 15, 2024 20:00:54 GMT
The reason nothing is working is because the civil servants never came back to work after Covid - only about 5% go into the office now. Believe it or not it's the civil servants who run the country, not the politicians, and they are simply not doing their job. I think it's a deliberate attempt to get rid of the Tory govt. Blair politicised the CS and they now refuse to thins that they don't agree with. Sack the lot of them. Given that civil servants basically oppose everything government try to do to appease the people i don’t see how making them waste three hours a day commuting to a central space where they conspire to oppose government helps that government achieve anything |
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