The LNER Encyclopedia

Dear all,

I'm a French student and I decided to write my Research Paper on the British
Railway Privatisation in the Lancashire.
I would like to collect documents and opinions on the subject in order to write
the best essay my teacher has never received.

However, for this, I really need your help.
Could you help me?
Do you have any documents about the situation before the privatisation and after
it.
How do feel people with the privatisation?
Do you think it has been a good thing around and for you?

Would you give me your personal testimony/opinion with respect to this topic?

Please be sure that nothing will be published, it is only an internal work for
my studies.

Thanks in advance for your help.
Jennifer

Hi all,

Sorry to bother you...could someone help me?
I have to give my Research Paper to my teacher on the 14th of April and I really need your help...

Thanks in advance
Jennifer

Jennifer,

I am sure your query has confused the members of this Forum.

Our focus here is on the London & North Eastern Railway or LNER which covered London and the eastern side of the UK between 1923 and 1948.

The privatisation issue, a much more recent phenomena, and it's effects on Lancashire in particular, is not a subject that features very often on the Forum.

If your query related to the LNER you might have had a better response from the members here who are usually very helpful.

Good luck with your project.

This covers Lancashire

http://www.lmssociety.org.uk/

Thank you...

I can understand that it is quite confusing but I sent a lot of mail and did not received many answers.
As far as I saw in your website, there is a lot of passionate people and I tried to get more info via your links.

I have contacted the gvt, the council etc...but I can't find the reports and figures I'm looking for...

Hi Jenny,

It may be that the documents that you are looking for are with-held due to the 30 year rule.

I know that this may seem rather bemusing, but because the privatisation was seen as a political process, the manarins at the Treasury and the Transport Department may have decided that keeping the details away from public scrutiny until the 2020s was the most tactful option.

One of the main casualties prior to privatisation was the Speedlink service, which was axed almost overnight - despite the millions of ££s in grants that had been spent installing or improving private sidings to many industries in order to increase the tonnage carried by the wagonload traffic.

Speedlink may have not been perfect, but it was keeping hundreds of thousands of lorry movements off the roads - and I doubt that those who made the decisions to just chop it, would want their reasoning pored over by opposition supporters.

Thanks a lot John

Do you allow me to include your comment in my Research Paper?

Britian's railways since privatisation and currently in 2014??.

Probably summed up as-

British Rail(ways) GOOD.

Network Rail BAD.

jenny75 wrote:Thanks a lot John

Do you allow me to include your comment in my Research Paper?

The problem is that I do not know for sure that my comments about the 30 year rule are true. They are just surmising on my part. I have no objection to you including the general points that I made, as long as you attribute them anonymously given the speculative nature of the comments.

If you can find a book called The Great Railway Conspiracy by David Henshaw (2013 edition), then Chapter 9 deals with the activities before and after privatisation, and although not specific to Lancashire, it will give some general information on that era.

My personal opinion was that privatisation in the UK was botched due to political dogma, and a "roads good, rails bad" attitude in certain political circles since the beginning of the 1950s. For that reason, I'm afraid you have chosen a very complex subject.

Do I think privatisation is an improvement over BR? No. The East Coast franchise has been run by the government for the last few years and has performed better than it did under private ownership, but sadly this is not within your geographical area.

strang steel wrote:

jenny75 wrote:Thanks a lot John

Do you allow me to include your comment in my Research Paper?

The problem is that I do not know for sure that my comments about the 30 year rule are true. They are just surmising on my part. I have no objection to you including the general points that I made, as long as you attribute them anonymously given the speculative nature of the comments.

If you can find a book called The Great Railway Conspiracy by David Henshaw (2013 edition), then Chapter 9 deals with the activities before and after privatisation, and although not specific to Lancashire, it will give some general information on that era.

My personal opinion was that privatisation in the UK was botched due to political dogma, and a "roads good, rails bad" attitude in certain political circles since the beginning of the 1950s. For that reason, I'm afraid you have chosen a very complex subject.

Do I think privatisation is an improvement over BR? No. The East Coast franchise has been run by the government for the last few years and has performed better than it did under private ownership, but sadly this is not within your geographical area.

Thanks a lot John.
Please be sure it will be anonymous.

I'm really pleased to have received your comment and opinion on that topic

In addition to that, there is also the irony of the UK privatisation - which barred the UK state funded British Rail from operating any of the franchises, but did not prevent companies that were wholly or partly state funded by foreign governments ( DB or SNCF for example) running services here, provided they were successful bidders.

Is it really true privatisation, if some services have just been moved from UK state control, to French or German state control (via railway subsidiaries)?

strang steel wrote:In addition to that, there is also the irony of the UK privatisation - which barred the UK state funded British Rail from operating any of the franchises, but did not prevent companies that were wholly or partly state funded by foreign governments ( DB or SNCF for example) running services here, provided they were successful bidders

Theoretically, the DB is also divided into track, freight and passenger arms and there are a lot of private and national (SBB Cargo) freight companies and local passenger companies operating here in Germany, however, many are subsidised by local government. In my neck of the woods, the Swiss SBB took over the local passenger concession from from the DB and by providing a 1/2 hr service and modern "Flirt" rolling stock, have increased the number of travellers by 80% over the last 10 years.

You might find a similar story for Transpennine, who run from Liverpool and Manchester Airport to destinations in the North East. They used to be pretty unreliable, but they invested in new stock (Siemens) and now run three (crowded) trains an hour in both directions. I know that after privatisation in West Yorkshire, the local transport authority invested in rail and a lot of stations which had been closed reopened again. Many of the traditional routes that had been closed during BR ownership reopened and the trains were very busy. On the downside, at one point many of the trains did not run because of shortage of staff, and you were left stranded (if you were lucky, you were provided with a taxi to your destination). You would have to look for similar stories in Lancashire.

You might also ask whether the concession system brings the right kind of investment and commitment for railways - just look at what happened to Virgin Railways on the West Coast recently (not to mention GNER on the East Coast). Why invest in rolling stock and a good service when the concession is a lottery?

Hope that this helps,

Peter

Dear all,

I just have my results and I passed my exams!
I received 16/20 for my research paper and I would like to thank you as you helped me a lot.

Thanks again for your help.
Cheers
Jennifer

Congratulations, Jennifer.

It is nice to know that our occasional contributions can be of assistance.