so, were the Lewisham trains DOO ? and if so, had a Guard been on each of the trains, would the result have been different ?
If I remember correctly (and I think I do...) 4 out of 5 of the trains with self-evacuating passengers were DOO. The 5th, which was also the service where passengers held on the longest before self-evacuating, had a guard.
At least one or two others were stranded, but had guards and did not self-evacuate.
Almost all the DOO trains stranded had self-evacuations, and almost all the guarded trains did not.
I think the RMT’s response was quite predictable. I do think they should now be more pragmatic, recognise the OBS role and start working with TOCs.
This has been suggested by many of the affected staff over the last year and I quite agree.
Some two years after these disputes began, it’s difficult to see what has really been achieved from the DFT’s perspective. Little if any cost saving, which in any case is massively outweighed by the cost of the disruption resulting from the industrial action and won’t be realised for many years. Little if any benefit for passengers, it sounds like very few trains were ever cancelled due to the lack of a guard.
To be fair, the rate of cancellations is not the best statistic to use, as the rate of trains which were delayed (but not cancelled) due to guards being unavailable was historically much higher than it is now. Yet, amongst those Southern routes which still have guards in whole or part (of which there remain a fair number), it is now far rarer - in fact, now virtually unheard-of, for trains to be waiting for guards.
The suggestion that previous poor diagramming was responsible for most delays (and that an earlier introduction of the dedicated OBS crew controllers would have also been of great benefit when there were only guards) is of course not widely seen...
... It smacks of incompetence and I can see why people believe it’s motivated by an ideological agenda. There simply doesn’t seem to be much of a rational basis for it.
Mr Wilkinson would appear to be known less for logical thought and more for ideological outbursts.
One can only assume that they are playing the long game. Go through the expensive battle now and then drop all of the OBSs over the course of the next franchise, assuming that they can drop them and don't run into issues with DOO on the accessibility front.
The accessibility front is very pertinent. The DfT have effectively made their mistake when mandating a rollout of DOO trains on lines where many stations are partially or fully unstaffed. Consider the sheer investment to provide regular, reliable, trackable staff at stations for accessibility assistance and to ensure revenue can be collected. A lot of these unstaffed stations, especially around outer Sussex and the South Coast, are well-used by people who need reliable assistance and the fallout is horrendous when it goes wrong. Unless you can provide a full first-to-last staff complement at all stations, except in the most exceptional circumstances, DOO in its truest sense is virtually unworkable for at least the next few years.
... 2. The simple common sense fact the disputes have cost so much they couldn’t have any possible motive other than much bigger savings than achieved by continuing to employ OBSs ...
A genuine element of the proposed monetary saving is probably already realised in training and train delay costs. How much this could have been improved by making the existing system more efficient (see my points above) is up for debate, and it would be a good one to have.
Yes, removing all the staff is of course a reasonably cheap outlook, but there is probably some "middle ground" in the original aim, somewhere between non-compulsory staff and none at all at certain times, which was skewed (quite rightly) by the considerable demands by those needing actual, tangible help with travel.
Remember that when the dispute first started, and conductors were becoming "assisting" conductors / guards on routes where they previously dispatched... they had nothing to do with checking on the platforms for anyone needing help with travel, which is now compulsory! Effectively there was no compulsory presence during station calls, no compulsory position in the train, and virtually no compulsory duties.
With the need for information, travel assistance and the ability to prove staff have actually been on a train, it's become harder to remove the OBS role without a lot of people noticing very quickly.
GTR have also been quick to make the very most of those onboard staff with genuinely excellent customer service skills. To some degree they appear to have used this for good publicity - to make it look like the staff are employed only because they're all really good at cheering passengers up - when they have to now be there for quasi-operational reasons anyway!
3. Remind us, what happened to the GATEX train hosts?
They were reinstated from 0500-midnight on brand new trains which were fully capable of running DOO (no matter the debate about how objectionable that method of operation might be for 12 coach trains running full of unfamiliar passengers).
They may originally have been disbanded, but from my conversations with rail staff, they're very much now here to stay. Possibly longest of all OBS roles, in the distant future. Premium and all that!
Gatwick has already been "de-barriered", albeit with nominal gateline staff. Make of this what you will.
