Great British Railways consultation

<div>Dear Great British Railways consultation team,</div><div> </div><div>Thank you so much for the opportunity to offer my views on how you can improve our railway system so that it works better for all passengers. </div><div> </div><div>I would like to start by congratulating you on passing the Passenger Railway Passenger (Public Ownership) Act to bring train operations into public hands. I am a big supporter of this new law, and recent polling shows that public ownership of rail is supported by 76% of the British public. [1]</div><div> </div><div>Public ownership of the TOCs (Train Operating Companies) presents the government with a historic opportunity to refocus the whole of our railway system on the needs of passengers rather than on the profits of private shareholders from around the world. In my response to your Great British Railways (GBR) consultation, I will outline four additional things that I think you should do to make public ownership a big success. </div><div> </div><div><strong>1. Reinstate key accessibility, environmental and socioeconomic duties</strong></div><div><br>I was alarmed to learn that the Association of British Commuters and other disability advocacy groups have revealed that the government has removed GBR’s initial guiding principles set out by the Conservative government, namely, the duty to “maximise social and economic value”. [2] This duty meant that GBR would have to cater to, among other things, the needs of disabled persons and the environment.</div><div> </div><div>Boris Johnson's government signed up to these basic duties, and this government wants to remove them.</div><div> </div><div>I know that Parliament’s Transport Select Committee has written to the government to ask for clarity on the status of those key duties.[3] Transport minister Lord Hendy has responded [4] but has refused to reinstate these basic duties.</div><div> </div><div>At a very basic level, our railway needs to work for everyone who uses it, including people who have accessibility needs. Our railway can also be an important vehicle in our fight against climate change. I am asking you to reinstate those key duties so that our railway, under GBR, is run in the public interest. Give GBR the duty to be accessible to everyone, have regard for the environment and promote other social and economic benefits that the railway can deliver.</div><div><br><strong>2. Create Great British Trains - a publicly owned rolling stock company</strong></div><div><br>While I am excited by your decision to take train operations into public ownership, leaving the role of the private rolling stock companies completely intact would be a mistake.</div><div> </div><div>I believe that the government should consider creating a publicly owned rolling stock company to gradually phase out the railway’s dependence on the profiteering private rolling stock companies. This is normal in other countries, such as Germany and the USA.</div><div> </div><div>There is a precedent in the UK too for the public sector buying trains directly to get the best deal. In 2013, Transport for London said that private finance for Crossrail’s purchase of around 600 electric multiple-unit cars would be “complicated and expensive” and won approval to buy them directly instead. More recently, the Liverpool City Region has opted to directly finance the purchase of 52 brand new Class 777 trains for Mersey Rail, rather than using private finance.</div><div> </div><div>You could set up a publicly-owned rolling stock company, which could be called Great British Trains, building on the successful branding of Great British Energy. This company would directly purchase and own all new trains in our railway system to replace privately owned ones as their current contracts end or as old trains are decommissioned. It could also look at manufacturing trains directly.</div><div> </div><div>In the last 10 years, the private rolling stock companies have paid out around £3.6 billion in dividends to their shareholders, £360 million per average year. This money could instead be used to reduce passenger rail fares by 4.1%.[5] Alternatively, according to the RMT, rolling stock dividends between 2012 and 2018 could have paid for 700 new trains.[6] </div><div> </div><div><strong>3. Give passengers a real voice in GBR </strong></div><div><br>Great British Railways is a historic opportunity to put passengers in the driving seat in our railway system. As a passenger, I believe I should have a real say over what happens on the railway. Just as trade unions represent workers, the people who use the railway need our own organisation to represent us.</div><div> </div><div>The public ownership campaign organisation, We Own It, has produced a model of 21st-century public ownership that makes our public services accountable to us, public service users, and I encourage you to consider adopting it for GBR [7]. This would involve a number of key elements: </div><ul><li>Creating an independent organisation, or repurposing Transport Focus, to stand up for passengers as their watchdog.</li><li>Great British Railways would have representatives from this passenger organisation on its boards nationally and regionally.</li><li>Passengers should be enabled to register and join that organisation.</li><li>The members of this passenger organisation should be able to vote for the leadership of the watchdog. Decision making would be transparent, with open meetings and data, enabling passengers to contribute their ideas and experiences to improve our railway system.</li></ul><div><div>I believe that this approach will ensure that the passenger watchdog stands up for the interests of passengers, rather than simply rubber-stamping government plans. </div><div> </div><div><strong>4. Back reforms with proper investment</strong></div></div><div> </div><div>Our railway system has historically been starved of investment, and as a result is lagging behind the top railway systems in Europe. Switzerland, which consistently appears at the top of railway rankings [8], invests around €477 per capita into their railway system. Britain invests around €116.[9]  </div><div> </div><div>We cannot get a Switzerland-quality railway without comparable levels of investment.</div><div> </div><div>This investment will enable the government to invest in rebuilding track, expanding electrification, upgrading ageing rolling stock, etc. These will reduce the incidence of cancellations and delays, which frequently cause nightmares for passengers in our railway.</div><div> </div><div>Very importantly, it will enable the government to cut rail fares for passengers, which will incentivise more people to ditch their cars and use the railway. This would have enormous benefits for our environment.</div><div> </div><div>I believe that the government should consider a policy of investing a minimum of 0.5% of GDP in the railway system every year, which will take government spending on the railway from £12.5 billion last year to £14 billion. Switzerland invests 0.63% of the country’s GDP on rail infrastructure per year.</div><div> </div><div>Investment also pays for itself. £2 of economic activity is created in the British economy as a result of every £1 the government invests in the railway system. [10]</div><div> </div><div>I urge you to seriously consider these ideas. This Labour government is taking a big step by bringing the railway into public ownership. If this move is seen as a failure that will be very damaging. If the railways remain under-funded, still leaking money to the private sector, with key duties abandoned and an ineffective passenger voice, this is a serious risk. I very much hope to see these thoughts and proposals reflected in the Railways Bill that you table before Parliament later this year. </div><div> </div><div>Thank you very much for your time and consideration.</div><div> </div><div><strong>References:</strong><br>1. https://weownit.org.uk/why-public-ownership/support-public-ownership</div><div><br>2. https://abcommuters.com/2025/02/24/dept-for-transport-drops-main-public-interest-duties-from-gbr-in-major-step-back-for-accessibility-and-environment/</div><div><br>3. https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/47039/documents/243211/default/</div><div><br>4. https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/47449/documents/246154/default/</div><div><br>5. https://weownit.org.uk/news/research-huge-train-company-dividends-could-fund-passenger-fares-freeze/</div><div><br>6. https://www.rmt.org.uk/news/publications/the-rosco-racket-why-its-time-to-take-control-of-uk-rolling/</div><div><br>7. https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/oureconomy/when-we-own-it-model-public-ownership-transport-21st-century/</div><div><br>8. https://www.transportenvironment.org/uploads/files/Embargo-lifted-09122024-European-Ranking-of-Rail-operators-REPORT-Updated-20122024-2.pdf</div><div><br>9. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1414740/per-capita-investment-in-rail-infrastructure-europe/</div><div><br>10. https://www.oxfordeconomics.com/resource/The-economic-contribution-of-UK-rail/</div><div><strong id="docs-internal-guid-468a51a1-7fff-ea02-533c-c0a292e48aa1"></strong></div>

Demand the government reinstate Great British Railway’s public interest duty - respond to the consultation

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