The LNER Encyclopedia

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Thomas-the-Tank/

the link above points to an open petition to the UK's Prime Minister to investigate possible abuse of copyright laws by HIT Entertainment in their licensing of 'Day Out with Thomas' events that are so vital to the survival of smaller preserved railways.

HIT have come down hard on preserved lines with new regulations regarding these events. These include, but are not neccassarily limited to:

-Enhanced criminal record checks on all railway staff and volunteers. (I personally agree with this one, though)
-Anyone playing the role of 'Sir Topham Hatt', a.k.a. the Fat Controller, must either be hired from HIT to attend an event, or be trained for the role by HIT for a cost of roughly £3000.
-Any locomotives and rolling stock used for these events must be approved by HIT before being used.

These new regulations, among others, have lead to some outrageous cases, such as the Talyllyn Railway having to tussle with HIT in order to be able to run their locomotives as the Skarloey Railway characters that they inspired, and the Nene Valley Railway not being able to use its 'Thomas' engine for its events (This engine was the very first 'real' Thomas engine, and was named by the Rev. W. Awdry himself). The regulations also have the general effect of wiping off a significant amount of funds that the preservation scene needs to survive, and instead hands it over to HIT. The resulting predicament has forced some railways to abandon 'Thomas' events and find other ways to raise funds.

This is, quite frankly, a gross abuse of the copyright that HIT have over the 'Thomas' series, and is not in the best interests of the public whatsoever. I ask anyone who reads this, and feels the same way, to sign the petition above so that we can get some Government action on this issue and prevent potential deprivation of funds to herigate railways. Thank you.

With my children i've used the Thomas books for many purposes. From simply reading the books as a bedtime story, using the loco numbers to help them remember numbers, and later on, showing them parodies with real railway operation. Let me just add at this point if you were going to fix a leaking vacuum pipe with a newspaper and bootlaces it may need to be wet to help it form into the ridges on the pipe. Mum was reading a story the other day and came and asked 'what are sludge tenders' and 'were they real?' A quick trawl into my website produced a signalbox diagram for Langley Junc, Stevenage showing the sidings for the water softening plant. Sludge tenders were used there regularly to transport, probably by today's standards a highly toxic by-product, from there to Connington tip.
The problem as i see it is we need Thomas and all his friends to introduce youngsters into railways. Our hereitage lines are ticking along nicely at the moment but i know there is a skills shortage. If we, older people (41 myself) want to be able to see varied locations to see trains as we want to see them we need to bring in young blood. My kids have Dad who works for the big railway, one heritage line, has signalboxes in the garden, a garden railway, freinds who own loco's and even whole standard gauge railways, but how do we attract people who do not have access like i do to railways? My lad's teacher told him off the other day for making up stories about real steam engines chuffing through our hometown. Steam engines were all scrapped didn't i know? We let these people educate our children. I wonder what she is going to make of the pictures he is taking to school after half term of him at the controls of a certain rather large and hot 462 locomotive?

Anyway rant over for now. I feel our hereitage lines are being taken for a ride over Thomas. We need him. Can we really pay the amounts being asked?

Excellent points, R. Pike

R. pike wrote: Anyway rant over for now. I feel our hereitage lines are being taken for a ride over Thomas. We need him. Can we really pay the amounts being asked?

Precisely the problem. The new regulations that HIT are trying to put through will devastate the smaller heritage lines, and result in abandonments of Thomas events, which will lead to alienation of the youth from heritage railways, something that most railways can't afford to happen. We need to get as many signitures on the petition above as we can, to stop this from happening.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/help/3681938.stm

This BBC news illustrates the point rather well. Now Swanage seems to be struggling for funds due to HIT's selfish new rules. We need all the signatures we can get onto the petition above to put a stop to this!

Finally an answer to this problem.
However, another cop-out by the government back home.
I signed this petition and just this morning got an email from the PM's office with this link:

http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page17943

You are not gonna like this at all. I didn't.

Shameful is about the most polite I can say.

Malcolm

Yes a phoboff if i ever read one. Got my reply yesterday and was not impressed.

You might not like it, but they're right in the 'big picture'.

However, I think there are split rights - and this is a lot of the problem. Eg. the case of Stepney. The Bluebell Railway clearly have rights to have "Stepney Events". I think it just requires some creating thinking by many of these preserved railways?

Also, did the Awdry family sign all rights to HIT? What about Christopher Awdry and his books? I suspect rights to the books are also divided, although the division is probably quite complicated (the Toy Story characters come to mind where Disney and Pixar held rights to different characters - that is until Disney eventually bought Pixar).


Richard