The Trains

[Yellow Fever 3,848]

Today - I note its ASLEF going on strike again. This extortion has to be ended. 

The trains anyway are a mess - need a complete restructuring as they don't work for anybody.

Sack the drivers, make redundant (statutory minimum terms)  and close it all down for a month in the summer - and then re-advertise new jobs / new modern terms on sensible pay with new companies. Take it or leave it.

I'm fed up subsidizing these over paid goons.

Edited April 5 by Yellow Fever

[ricardo 7,444]

2 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

Today - I note its ASLEF gong on strike again. This extortion has to be ended. 

The trains anyway are a mess - need a complete restructuring as they don't work for anybody.

Sack the drivers, make redundant (statutory minimum terms)  and close it all down for a month in the summer - and then re-advertise new jobs / new modern terms on sensible pay with new companies. Take it or leave it.

I'm fed up subsidizing these over paid goons.

Haven't been on a train for years so they can stay on strike forever for all I care.

I don't know what sort of money they get but they can obviously afford to lose a lot of days pay without much affect. It appears to be more about manning and working conditions. Things change and people don't like change.

 

[Yellow Fever 3,848]

38 minutes ago, ricardo said:

Haven't been on a train for years so they can stay on strike forever for all I care.

I don't know what sort of money they get but they can obviously afford to lose a lot of days pay without much affect. It appears to be more about manning and working conditions. Things change and people don't like change.

 

Years ago I used to used regularly 'commute' to LHR - eventually got so fed up would always drive and park (from here). Rail was too expensive, unreliable and even then in order to get anywhere near a sensibly priced ticket had lots of constraints. And that was just for 1 person. Recently had to look at the trains again (to London)- ended up arranging travel around strike days or bus replacement services. It's not a 'service' but a joke - a cash-cow rip off of the public.

Driver-less (ASLEF-less) trains are clearly the way forward - hell, they'll never otherwise compete with door to door driver-less-taxis.

It's time to think the unthinkable and sort it once and for all. Modernize.

[Creative Midfielder 2,004]

46 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

Today - I note its ASLEF going on strike again. This extortion has to be ended. 

The trains anyway are a mess - need a complete restructuring as they don't work for anybody.

Sack the drivers, make redundant (statutory minimum terms)  and close it all down for a month in the summer - and then re-advertise new jobs / new modern terms on sensible pay with new companies. Take it or leave it.

I'm fed up subsidizing these over paid goons.

I'd say whether ASLEF are indulging in extortion is debateable and not particularly important as the real problem is highlighted by your second sentence.

Our railways, much like the water companies, are prime examples of the utter stupidity of privatising vital public utilities.

These two areas should never have even been considered for privatisation because the rationale of introducing competition into those industries was always understood to be impossible but Thatcher (who presumably already starting to go bonkers by this stage) pressed ahead anyway.

In case of water they simply ignored the lack of competition and created a regulator who for many years has been utterly useless and for the railways they came up with an artificial, convoluted and very costly scheme of separating our railways into track, rolling stock and operating companies, creating the very expensive shambles we suffered with ever since.

I think it’s pretty clear that in both industries the problems are so fundamental and longstanding that no progress is going to be made until they are brought back into public ownership.

[Naturalcynic 681]

1 hour ago, Creative Midfielder said:

I'd say whether ASLEF are indulging in extortion is debateable and not particularly important as the real problem is highlighted by your second sentence.

 

Our railways, much like the water companies, are prime examples of the utter stupidity of privatising vital public utilities.

 

These two areas should never have even been considered for privatisation because the rationale of introducing competition into those industries was always understood to be impossible but Thatcher (who presumably already starting to go bonkers by this stage) pressed ahead anyway.

 

In case of water they simply ignored the lack of competition and created a regulator who for many years has been utterly useless and for the railways they came up with an artificial, convoluted and very costly scheme of separating our railways into track, rolling stock and operating companies, creating the very expensive shambles we suffered with ever since.

 

I think it’s pretty clear that in both industries the problems are so fundamental and longstanding that no progress is going to be made until they are brought back into public ownership.

 

I share your opinion that important public utilities should be in public ownership, but that said I don’t think that would have made the slightest difference to the ongoing train strikes, organised and coordinated by hardline union leaders largely for political purposes on the pretext of protecting working conditions, many of which are ridiculously outdated. I agree with Yellow Fever - sack the lot of them and start again a few weeks later with new, fit for purpose, terms and conditions.

[ricardo 7,444]

1 hour ago, Yellow Fever said:

 

It's time to think the unthinkable and sort it once and for all. Modernize.

'Anging is too good for 'em.😉

[Creative Midfielder 2,004]

10 minutes ago, Naturalcynic said:

I share your opinion that important public utilities should be in public ownership, but that said I don’t think that would have made the slightest difference to the ongoing train strikes, organised and coordinated by hardline union leaders largely for political purposes on the pretext of protecting working conditions, many of which are ridiculously outdated. I agree with Yellow Fever - sack the lot of them and start again a few weeks later with new, fit for purpose, terms and conditions.

Whilst that might seem an attractive option, I'm pretty sure that it would be illegal under current employment law - I know P&O got away with doing it (when they didn't even have the strike issue or any other issue) purely to avoid paying even minimum wage but as far as I understand it that was only because of some bizzare loophole that the ferries were registered in Panama or similar.

[Yellow Fever 3,848]

13 minutes ago, Creative Midfielder said:

Whilst that might seem an attractive option, I'm pretty sure that it would be illegal under current employment law - I know P&O got away with doing it (when they didn't even have the strike issue or any other issue) purely to avoid paying even minimum wage but as far as I understand it that was only because of some bizzare loophole that the ferries were registered in Panama or similar.

I made the 'click bait' comment because something has to change. Frankly I don't see ASLEF and the drivers as any different to the Water Companies fat cats. They all abuse their monopoly for gain.

Same as Thames Water. Stop the subsidy - all will go bust (asset sale) and we can start again. Companies are allowed to go bust!

Edited April 5 by Yellow Fever

[littleyellowbirdie 2,611]

It's not just the Labour costs, and to be fair there have been a fair number of salary freezes in the industry.

As it stands, all rolling stock is owned by three private companies who lease it to the operators. The profits of those companies have trebled in the last year.

At the very least, it seems like a winner for the taxpayer for the public to own the rolling stock and lease it to operators.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/feb/18/profits-of-uks-private-train-leasing-firms-treble-in-a-year

Edited April 5 by littleyellowbirdie

[littleyellowbirdie 2,611]

23 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

I made the 'click bait' comment because something has to change. Frankly I don't see ASLEF and the drivers as any different to the Water Companies fat cats. They all abuse their monopoly for gain.

Same as Thames Water. Stop the subsidy - all will go bust (asset sale) and we can start again. Companies are allowed to go bust!

Nobody rational believes that anything will ever change regarding international law on refugees, which is demonstrably not fit for purpose and is destroying public support for the very concept of international law.

These are the specific problems that need to be addressed and aren't being addressed. If they aren't addressed then in the end there'll be a tipping point where more people than not will say to hell with international law, just like they did with the EU.

The requirements are very simple. Change to allow any failed asylum seekers to be removed from the country. No exceptions. Ideally multilateral, but unilateral action has to be on the table.

Edited April 5 by littleyellowbirdie

[Aggy 766]

7 hours ago, Yellow Fever said:

Years ago I used to used regularly 'commute' to LHR - eventually got so fed up would always drive and park (from here). Rail was too expensive, unreliable and even then in order to get anywhere near a sensibly priced ticket had lots of constraints. And that was just for 1 person. Recently had to look at the trains again (to London)- ended up arranging travel around strike days or bus replacement services. It's not a 'service' but a joke - a cash-cow rip off of the public.

 

I genuinely can’t remember the last time I’ve been on a train back from London that was as you’d expect. Every time for years either mine has been cancelled so I’ve had to get another one, or was crammed because another service had been cancelled and about three trains’ worth of people were cramming onto mine. And let’s not get started on anything going east/west instead of north / south…

I only travel by train now if the company is paying and if it’s for a meeting I wouldn’t mind getting out of!

Edited April 5 by Aggy

[Fen Canary 889]

5 hours ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

Nobody rational believes that anything will ever change regarding international law on refugees, which is demonstrably not fit for purpose and is destroying public support for the very concept of international law.

These are the specific problems that need to be addressed and aren't being addressed. If they aren't addressed then in the end there'll be a tipping point where more people than not will say to hell with international law, just like they did with the EU.

The requirements are very simple. Change to allow any failed asylum seekers to be removed from the country. No exceptions. Ideally multilateral, but unilateral action has to be on the table.

Think you meant for this one to be on the other conversation 

[Fen Canary 889]

8 hours ago, Yellow Fever said:

Today - I note its ASLEF going on strike again. This extortion has to be ended. 

The trains anyway are a mess - need a complete restructuring as they don't work for anybody.

Sack the drivers, make redundant (statutory minimum terms)  and close it all down for a month in the summer - and then re-advertise new jobs / new modern terms on sensible pay with new companies. Take it or leave it.

I'm fed up subsidizing these over paid goons.

So to improve the train service we just need to destroy the quality of life of the drivers? Why is everything always a race to the bottom? 

[littleyellowbirdie 2,611]

 

 

1 hour ago, Fen Canary said:

So to improve the train service we just need to destroy the quality of life of the drivers? Why is everything always a race to the bottom? 

God knows how I cross posted that...

Anyway, I looked up train drivers salaries in France and it came back as 23-49k euros a year.

In the UK it starts at about 30,000 pounds with an average of 50k pounds a year (nearly 60,000 euros). That's significantly higher.

There are 19000 train drivers in the UK,  so that's just under a billion of that 8.6 billion going to train drivers, or about 10% of all turnover.

That said, even with no drivers a 10% cut in ticket prices would have still had my train ticket from Gatwick to Rochester more expensive than my British airways flight from Bordeaux to Gatwick last week.

 

Edited April 5 by littleyellowbirdie

[Yellow Fever 3,848]

1 hour ago, Fen Canary said:

So to improve the train service we just need to destroy the quality of life of the drivers? Why is everything always a race to the bottom? 

In this case they are part of the problem in making rail unviable / unaffordable for anything other than the London commuter. It needs a reset.

 

[Nuff Said 5,223]

On 05/04/2024 at 23:30, Yellow Fever said:

In this case they are part of the problem in making rail unviable / unaffordable for anything other than the London commuter. It needs a reset.

 

If you added up every train driver’s salary, it would be a drop in the ocean compared to the figures we’re talking about the train leasing companies making in profit. Follow the money. 

[Fen Canary 889]

On 06/04/2024 at 11:30, Yellow Fever said:

In this case they are part of the problem in making rail unviable / unaffordable for anything other than the London commuter. It needs a reset.

 

They haven’t had a pay rise since 2019, and in that time inflation hit double digits. Asking for 4% this year and next doesn’t strike me as particularly excessive 

[littleyellowbirdie 2,611]

2 hours ago, Fen Canary said:

They haven’t had a pay rise since 2019, and in that time inflation hit double digits. Asking for 4% this year and next doesn’t strike me as particularly excessive 

You don't think it's excessive when they're already radically ahead of their European counterparts on salaries?

Drivers take about 10% of all ticket revenue for what is not really that skilled a job, while the employee requirements to sustain the service goes way beyond just drivers: Ticket inspectors, signal operators, train station staff, rail maintenance, rolling stock maintenance... 100,000 employees to sustain on that ticket revenue in total, 19,000 of which are drivers.

Edited April 7 by littleyellowbirdie

[Yellow Fever 3,848]

4 hours ago, Nuff Said said:

If you added up every train driver’s salary, it would be a drop in the ocean compared to the figures we’re talking about the train leasing companies making in profit. Follow the money. 

 

3 hours ago, Fen Canary said:

They haven’t had a pay rise since 2019, and in that time inflation hit double digits. Asking for 4% this year and next doesn’t strike me as particularly excessive 

Here is the base offer that they are moaning about.

Already extremely well paid and it seems all that the rail companies really want them to do is to accept some modern (professional if they want to be thought of as such) modern working practices (at least late 20th century).

https://media.raildeliverygroup.com/news/the-rail-industry-makes-offer-to-aslef-to-drive-up-performance-for-passengers

"If accepted, the proposal would mean the base salary for the average driver would increase from £60,000, to almost £65,000 "by the end of 2023."

After reading this I'm even more inclined to sack the lot and rehire/reset with new terms on about 2/3 pay.

The money saved give to the far more deserving junior doctors.

[Nuff Said 5,223]

1 hour ago, Yellow Fever said:

The money saved give to the far more deserving junior doctors.

As soon as you start suggesting ridiculous zero sum arguments like this, you identify your arguments as ignorant, foolish or simply provocative. Do you really think it works like this?

[Yellow Fever 3,848]

4 minutes ago, Nuff Said said:

As soon as you start suggesting ridiculous zero sum arguments like this, you identify your arguments as ignorant, foolish or simply provocative. Do you really think it works like this?

No - I think the greater point now went over your head.

Clearly the train drivers are overpaid as compared to other far more essential public sector workers. They also refuse to modernize their working practices to make a more efficient railway. They think they are also in a position of 'power' to dictate terms - a monopoly. Time to disabuse them of that (and yes I'm centre left but know a defunct dinosaur when I see it).

Yes other things are needed to - the structure of the system and so on but if the railways are to continue they must be cost effective and consumer  / customer leaning else they will go the way of the coal mines (and miners). They are not a 'make work' scheme.

[Nuff Said 5,223]

5 minutes ago, Yellow Fever said:

No - I think the greater point now went over your head.

Clearly the train drivers are overpaid as compared to other far more essential public sector workers. They also refuse to modernize their working practices to make a more efficient railway. They think they are also in a position of 'power' to dictate terms - a monopoly. Time to disabuse them of that (and yes I'm centre left but know a defunct dinosaur when I see it).

Yes other things are needed to - the structure of the system and so on but if the railways are to continue they must be cost effective and consumer  / customer leaning else they will go the way of the coal mines (and miners). They are not a 'make work' scheme.

So what’s it got to do with junior doctors?

[Yellow Fever 3,848]

Just now, Nuff Said said:

So what’s it got to do with junior doctors?

It's by example - those the general public are far far far more supportive of than the train drivers. 

[littleyellowbirdie 2,611]

2 hours ago, Nuff Said said:

As soon as you start suggesting ridiculous zero sum arguments like this, you identify your arguments as ignorant, foolish or simply provocative. Do you really think it works like this?

To be fair, I don't really think he's literally arguing that. It's just pointing out that a guy who basically operates an accelerator and a break without a steering wheel earns more than someone who has spent years paying for their own education to poke around in people's bodies saving their lives. Junior doctors are on about 35k a year v a train driver on about 65k a week.

Like I said, UK train drivers are well ahead of their EU counterparts on pay.

You even compare it to a lorry driver, which is very tightly regulated, someone who has to actually deal directly with their loads, brake, accelerate, use a steering wheel, and do some pretty nifty reversing work on 35k a year and it's hard not to raise an eyebrow.

They are paid that well because they have a very militant union who can bring everything to a standstill if they don't get what they want and do so, because they can do so without risking anyone's lives unlike doctors, nurses, police, and fire services.

Firefighters: People who have to go into burning buildings getting people out earn about £35k a year. A traindriver gets over 2/3 of what a constituency MP gets, and there's only about 600 MPs for the whole country, not 19,000!

I definitely agree with you that they're not the only problem, but they are a problem and they're taking the Michael a bit.

The more I think about it though, the more I think a strategy to bring rolling stock back into public ownership and lease it to operators, while keeping the franchise model, would be a great way of having a moderating mechanism to moderate franchises that profiteer. Maybe you could have a system where leases go up for franchises that look to be profiteering, with the money handed as a credit to season ticket holders on that line or something?

Overall, I do think the payment problems with trains would be 10 times worse if it simply went back to a monolithic nationalised system, while accepting that t he public are currently mostly being screwed over by the large businesses doing the leasing of the hardware.

 

Edited April 7 by littleyellowbirdie

[Nuff Said 5,223]

16 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

but they are a problem

Why are they a problem? Because they do a highly safety critical job and are relatively well-paid for it?
 

They are not the problem, the problems in this country are firmly at the feet of an out of touch, isolated, over-privileged bunch of w*nkers from Eton and their hangers-on who think the answer is to pay them and their wealthy friends ever more while the rest of us experience ever declining public services. Have you seen the state of the roads, the schools, the courts, the heath service, child services and thousands of other things that make life bearable, even improving for the vast majority? Don’t fall for this, focus on what matters.

[littleyellowbirdie 2,611]

1 hour ago, Nuff Said said:

Why are they a problem? Because they do a highly safety critical job and are relatively well-paid for it?
 

They are not the problem, the problems in this country are firmly at the feet of an out of touch, isolated, over-privileged bunch of w*nkers from Eton and their hangers-on who think the answer is to pay them and their wealthy friends ever more while the rest of us experience ever declining public services. Have you seen the state of the roads, the schools, the courts, the heath service, child services and thousands of other things that make life bearable, even improving for the vast majority? Don’t fall for this, focus on what matters.

 

Firemen are safety critical, lorry drivers are safety critical, lots of things have major safety elements that aren't as well paid as that. Train drivers are on amazingly good money for what the job entails. You turn up to work and you leave work and forget about it until the next shift.

One straight question to you: Do you really think it's proportionate that £1 in every £10 spent on rail fares, given the huge range of skills and jobs needed to actually maintain a functioning train network, going only to train drivers is proportionate? That's what the state of affairs is.

Here's a fun one: A Ryanair pilot is on £38,000 to £88,000. On average, that puts train drivers in the same ball park as pilots. Seriously?!

Regarding your comment on MPs, MPs are on about 93k a year. With 600 of them. That's 56 million a year. Train drivers on 60k a year with 19,000 of them is 1.14 billion pounds. They are massively overpaid for what the job is in my view, and interestingly well ahead of what their counterparts on the continent get. I'm with you that there are a lot of other things in the train service where there's a lot of profiteering going on, but I don't see any reason to sympathise with train drivers going on strike at all. Those salary hikes won't come out of the lease companies costs for the trains; it'll be a 0.5% rise in the price of a ticket on it's own before you look at the other rising costs.

 

Edited April 7 by littleyellowbirdie

[Fen Canary 889]

5 hours ago, Yellow Fever said:

 

Here is the base offer that they are moaning about.

Already extremely well paid and it seems all that the rail companies really want them to do is to accept some modern (professional if they want to be thought of as such) modern working practices (at least late 20th century).

https://media.raildeliverygroup.com/news/the-rail-industry-makes-offer-to-aslef-to-drive-up-performance-for-passengers

"If accepted, the proposal would mean the base salary for the average driver would increase from £60,000, to almost £65,000 "by the end of 2023."

After reading this I'm even more inclined to sack the lot and rehire/reset with new terms on about 2/3 pay.

The money saved give to the far more deserving junior doctors.

Right, so because junior doctors are underpaid then train drivers should accept a pay cut in real terms is the basis of your argument? Does this apply to the top brass of the rail franchises too? Do all the CEOs have to accept a pay freeze until junior doctors are paid the same as them? Can the shareholders not receive any dividends until junior doctors salaries improve? Or is it just the workers who have to suffer and see their standard of living diminish?

How many billions have been skimmed off the railways since privatisation that could have gone towards junior doctors salaries (or much needed maintenance and upgrade)? Why not aim your anger at that? At least the drivers actually keep the trains moving 

[littleyellowbirdie 2,611]

3 minutes ago, Fen Canary said:

Right, so because junior doctors are underpaid then train drivers should accept a pay cut in real terms is the basis of your argument? Does this apply to the top brass of the rail franchises too? Do all the CEOs have to accept a pay freeze until junior doctors are paid the same as them? Can the shareholders not receive any dividends until junior doctors salaries improve? Or is it just the workers who have to suffer and see their standard of living diminish?

How many billions have been skimmed off the railways since privatisation that could have gone towards junior doctors salaries (or much needed maintenance and upgrade)? Why not aim your anger at that? At least the drivers actually keep the trains moving 

I think you're missing the point. They're not underpaid; they're really well paid and they're holding the travelling public to ransom to be even better paid. It's not denying all the other things to talk about, like how franchises are run, pay of people other than train drivers, who are far less well-reimbursed, train leases, maintenance of the rail network, etc. but seriously: Why the hell would anyone sympathise with people doing a semi-skilled job like that earning a really really good salary like that?

Edited April 7 by littleyellowbirdie

[Nuff Said 5,223]

45 minutes ago, littleyellowbirdie said:

 

Firemen are safety critical, lorry drivers are safety critical, lots of things have major safety elements that aren't as well paid as that. Train drivers are on amazingly good money for what the job entails. You turn up to work and you leave work and forget about it until the next shift.

One straight question to you: Do you really think it's proportionate that £1 in every £10 spent on rail fares, given the huge range of skills and jobs needed to actually maintain a functioning train network, going only to train drivers is proportionate? That's what the state of affairs is.

I refer to you my earlier answer.

1 hour ago, Nuff Said said:

Why are they a problem? Because they do a highly safety critical job and are relatively well-paid for it?
 

They are not the problem, the problems in this country are firmly at the feet of an out of touch, isolated, over-privileged bunch of w*nkers from Eton and their hangers-on who think the answer is to pay them and their wealthy friends ever more while the rest of us experience ever declining public services. Have you seen the state of the roads, the schools, the courts, the heath service, child services and thousands of other things that make life bearable, even improving for the vast majority? Don’t fall for this, focus on what matters.

I

[littleyellowbirdie 2,611]

4 minutes ago, Nuff Said said:

I refer to you my earlier answer.

I

That's fine, but it doesn't really answer the point that they're preventing everyone going about their day to day business in London to get a 5% pay rise when they are already incredibly well-paid for a pretty basic job!

£65,000 a year! How many people on this forum earn that much? Not many, I'd bet. I sure don't.

Edited April 7 by littleyellowbirdie