Rail is an essential public service that will exist for many years as a tried and tested technology, and is indeed a booming industry. Coal mining became unimportant as our reserves ran out and it became replaced with other forms of energy, some of which were imported. Shipbuilding was never an essential public service. The British car industry was never an essential public service either.
Claims that these industries are on a par with the rail industry are entirely fallacious, particularly with reference to unionisation "destroying" those industries.
ALL modes of transport from an essential part of the way we now live our lives. I'd have a 3 mile walk to my nearest train station and that only sees one train in each direction not even everyday (Blaydon). It's at least 4 miles to the nearest station of any use (MetroCentre) and 9 miles to my nearest mainline station (Newcastle Central) How do I get to any of these? By bus. If I was a car driver, I may even drive. Indeed, I have to rely on my car driving Dad to get me back from Morecambe after Christmas due to the lack of any trains (how great is that for a supposed public service?).
Lest we forget, coal WAS essential til the 60s to enable trains to actually move (have you forgotten those things known as locomotives?)! Britain's wealth relied on its coal industry, both for powering its shipping (another thing you claim has never been essential which is utterly laughable for anyone who has an even basic understanding of the history of our nation!), running its power stations and heating its homes. Coal is STILL an essential resource in terms of creating electricity, the only difference is we now import it (at great social cost to whole swathes of communities in Wales, Yorkshire and the North East). No one knows what would have happened to the coal industry had things panned out differently. However, most commentators agree that Arthur Scargill almost single-handedly destroyed the industry he purported to be trying to protect. For him, it wasn't about saving the jobs of miners but in completely overthrowing the democratically elected government. Margaret Thatcher, for all her flaws (and my word there are many!), had her hand dealt for her in many ways. Scargill's actions caused the downfall of an entire industry.
I'm no car lover, but they are essential for many people to enable them to go about their daily lives. I choose to restrict myself to buses, but that does restrict where I can live and equally where I can work. Since deregulation, only the profitable routes survive which leaves many estates, villages and rural areas totally without public transport provision. For those people the car IS essential and by extension, the car building industry IS essential. To claim the railways are somehow more important than anything else is at best the misguided rose tinted view of an enthusiast and at worst completely false.
To get back on topic, I don't believe the vast majority of rail users do take any excuse to have a go at railway staff. I would say that I personally believe that they are extremely lucky to get the kind of renumeration they do and I find it very irksome when you see some of the initial demands of rail unions whenever pay negotiations take place, even if they are simple bargaining tools. As for Bob, he's just an objectional person. He represents his members well internally, but externally he is the reason so many people dislike the RMT and, sadly, sometimes that means by extension its members. I'll always remember him for his foul mouthed tirade at Morecambe Football Club's manager during at match at Dagenham at couple of years ago which showed him in his true colours. Incidentally, he may talk the talk as some kind of true left-wing warrior, but anyone with his salary could never be anything more than a champagne socialist!
Finally, the actions of unions in the late 70s and early 80s caused the stripping away of the so-called power of said unions. The actions of unions in 2011 may well be the catalyst for further union reform, most specifically a changing in rules so that at least 50% of union members would have to vote in a ballot before results become valid. Unions play a very dangerous game of cat and mouse. All of them, including the RMT, need to tread very carefully over the next 2 years.
