Scotrail Franchise - Abellio

[NotATrainspott]

Any inkling of actual corruption would have been seized upon by the lawyers of the unsuccessful bidders. If substantiated, they could have raked Transport Scotland and the Scottish Ministers over hot coals and there's no end to what political horrors could then have unfolded for the SNP. ScotRail is the single largest contract that the Scottish Ministers are responsible for awarding. Any irregularities would destroy the party and its dream of independence - any possible short term gain from corruption would be dwarfed by the inevitable and inescapable downsides. Unlike at a UK level, where Labour and the Tories will always come back like a perennial weed due to FPTP, the Scottish electorate are able to vote parties out of power in perpetuity.

 

[haggishunter]

The WHL for example has seen nothing since the 156s were forced upon the line

Nothing except the doubling of service frequency between Oban and Glasgow in this franchise and a couple of local services between Dalmally and Oban.

 

[GrimShady]

Nothing except the doubling of service frequency between Oban and Glasgow in this franchise and a couple of local services between Dalmally and Oban.

You are correct haggis. I should have been more specific, I was referring to the quality of stock.

 

[Blindtraveler]

Powes: already devolved, would have made sense given the SNPs rush to run it publically to give First an extention.. On First, I actually wish they had kept it as they did alright IMO.

Northlink: off topic but what a shambles. Its to be hoped the next tender due to start soon will be better run and give a better deal for passengers than the current shoestring Serco opps.

Political agendas: well there was issues raised but unsure how true and yes I think some individuals do have them. As for myself I dont mind if a foregn company run it and dont particularly mind it privatised as im not one for rush renationalisation and as I say I dont mind the opperater isnt brittish although every penny spent locally stays that way but I aint bothered

 

[47271]

I've looked very carefully at The Scotsman online and on Dalton's and Bibby's Twitter and can't find any trace of a report of this latest development in Scotrail performance stats. They must be off for Easter.

 

[HH]

As I recall, I think this is where the ideas of corruption came from, the Evening Times piece was the first one I came across when I searched.

The usual suspects line up to have a go, but Neil Bibby had yet to be invented at the time.

I'd forgotten about Mary Grant's complaint about bid scoring...

As I know most of the people involved here and a fair bit about what went on, I'll make a few comments:

1. Several people told me that to win ScotRail you not only had to win the bid, but also win the politics.

2. NX still had a lot of political baggage from when they ran the franchise previously; IMO if First hadn't stupidly lost Mary Grant they wouldn't have had a look in. Mary was a popular MD when at ScotRail.

3. TS were very keen on Abellio, due to Abellio engaging early with them and other stakeholders, listening to what they said and giving the right messages back; also it was felt that the Dutch model was one that Scotland could aspire to. I recall that First complained when the Minister went to the Netherlands to see NS Operations.

4. I think that they wanted to award it to Abellio, so 0.24% was always going to be enough. The margin was similarly tight when First beat NX for the previous award. Personally I think BAFOs are a good idea, but the UK franchising process has not gone down that route, probably because it would lengthen the process even more.

5. Poor Jeff Hoogestegger knows even less about transport than most of the people who post on these boards. While I don't know the inside story (very few do), based on my own conversations with the guy I feel it very likely that he was simply a fall guy here. One of his managers (not a direct report) wanted his win bonus too much and went a little bit too far in trying to get it, by hiring someone from the opposition; it's not like there was bribery or suchlike. I don't think Jeff was really up to the job of running Abellio, so maybe it was simply a cheap way to get rid of him.

6. Dominic Booth, who is running Abellio UK, certainly had nothing to do with the Dutch bus bid and there hasn't been, and I feel confident that there won't be, any hint of corruption in their UK operations.

To sum up, there probably is a story there, but these lazy hacks will never get it, because it's not about Abellio corruption, it's about the competency of TS.

 

[InOban]

I think Phil Verster left because he wasn't getting the political support he expected during the DOO dispute. After all, the business case for the new trains assumed Driver control.

 

[Blindtraveler]

Add to that the media pressure througout the run up to Xmas must have made his life rather hard to say the least and so everything got on top of him, pluss doubtless many other reasons. Thanks to HH for his summery above. Maybe time we moved on now we know the facts.

 

[GrimShady]

It's good to see work starting again at Glasgow Queen Street, I was deeply worried this was going to result in yet another half arsed Glasgow construction project.

 

[jingsmonty]

Good heavens, this won't suit a couple of political agendas.



http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/...iders_in_Britain_and_among_top_in_Europe____/

A classic case of number crunching hiding the reality - I wonder how many trains have been short-formed, punctuality is all good and well, but if you're standing because a 4 car 158 has shrunk to a 2 car because there are no sets available, that won't show up on these figures. Some of the DMUs (170s and 158s anyway - can't speak for the 156s) are in a poor state - the railway would fall apart without Duct Tape...

Hopefully things will improve soon with the E & GOHLE going live..

 

[GrimShady]

The station skipping is still going on! In a more limited form however but still going on.

 

[Highland37]

It's good to see work starting again at Glasgow Queen Street, I was deeply worried this was going to result in yet another half arsed Glasgow construction project.

I've just come from Queen Street right now (At Dalwhinne on an awful 158) and it does look a bit like it's been abandoned with the barriers all over the place at the North Hanover Street entrance.

 

[route101]

A classic case of number crunching hiding the reality - I wonder how many trains have been short-formed, punctuality is all good and well, but if you're standing because a 4 car 158 has shrunk to a 2 car because there are no sets available, that won't show up on these figures. Some of the DMUs (170s and 158s anyway - can't speak for the 156s) are in a poor state - the railway would fall apart without Duct Tape...

Hopefully things will improve soon with the E & GOHLE going live..

The poorest condtion internally i think is some of the 158s . I was on one last week and one row of airline seats only had one seat . Was on a 170 still with old interior too .

 

[Carntyne]

The station skipping is still going on! In a more limited form however but still going on.

Of course it is, As it does across the whole of the UK. ScotRail never said they would cease skip stopping, as it would be madness and cause MORE disruption.

How else do you recover a train service?

 

[Blindtraveler]

I have created a thread on the other public transport bord called Scottish Domestic Ferries Discussion where this facinating topic which Im enjoying can be perhaps better continued and hopefully a nice mod will move the last 20 or so posts from this thread over to it.

 

[Fishplate84]

Why do people make the assumption that if Scotrail was run by the public sector then things would be much better?

The Scottish Government specify the outcomes, they decide on the evaluation criteria, they pre-select the bidders and have a huge influence in what they want to buy. The assumption seems to be that if Scotrail was run by the public sector then the terms and conditions would be safe and enhanced, there would be more investment, improved performance, new trains and much lower fares.

This is a complete fantasy. If that was an outcome Scottish Government wanted and was prepared to pay for - if it could ever afford it anyway - they'd have set a very high quality threshold for bidders and a low pricing one. They'd have been specific on staff, terms, rolling stock, investments and fare levels too.
Abellio are delivering a Scotrail which the Scottish Government specified.

Publicly run railways were far from perfect and 20 years on lots of the legacy sloppy practices and woefully innefficient ways of working are still working their way out of the system.

In every other area of life, the Government and Councils are a byword for mediocre performance, cost cutting and wastefulness. Yet railways being publicly operated is seen as a panacea.
Whether publicly or privately operated, the only two sources of revenue to the railway are the taxpayer and fare paying passenger. If the taxpayer would accept paying more and the Government was prepared to spend more, they would already. I don't see why a publicly operated railway would fundamentally be any differently operated than Scotrail is today.

 

[Blindtraveler]

Never a load of truer words were said!

 

[Chrism20]

I completely agree.

If it were in public ownership there is every possibility that it would be no better or no worse than it currently is. I also think that taking it into public ownership could be political suicide. At the moment the franchisee is the buffer between the passenger and the government. If anything major were to go wrong it would end up a witch hunt and regardless of how you vote that would do no good to anyone.

 

[signallerscot]

The Scottish Government would have to take control of Network Rail Scotland for it to have any hope of the railway succeeding under public ownership and for that reason it will never happen until Scotland is an independent country.

 

[Railsigns]

Why do people make the assumption that if ScotRail was run by the public sector then things would be much better?

Because rail privatisation is a costly shambles?

 

[GrimShady]

Because rail privatisation is a costly shambles?

I have to agree on this one. I don't see why a nationalised company is instantly regarded a inefficient. Sectorisation seemed to work very well for BR towards the end of its life, infact it did seem that BR was actually "getting there" from the mid 80s onward. Privatisation seemed to reset everything again by at least a decade.

Surely every penny made on railway revenue should be invested back into the railway not issued to share holders?

I should add that CalMac is a perfect example of what can be achieved under public ownership.

 

[yorkie]

If anyone wishes to discuss ferries please use another thread. I have split some posts off to: Scottish Domestic Ferries discussion (splitting

Just a reminder that this thread is to discuss the Scotrail Franchise.

(If anyone wishes to discuss a different matter, or sees that someone else has gone off-topic and you wish to reply, please create a new thread, as for us to split posts into a new topic is very time consuming, thanks! )

 

[Blindtraveler]

The new thread idea might be a good one for those interested in the wrights/wrongs of a nationalised railway north of the border? Go ahead whoever feels like it, its a topic that holds little interest to me!

 

[XC90]

Those I work with who were around in the BR days mostly say they would not like to return to a nationalised railway.

That's the people I will listen to.

 

[380101]

Those I work with who were around in the BR days mostly say they would not like to return to a nationalised railway.

That's the people I will listen to.

I joined long after the BR days ended and have worked in the Public Sector prior to joining Scotrail. I believe the private sector brought about far better terms and conditions and pay to the railway - pay rises that would never have been achievable in the Public Sector.

Looking at my former public sector area (now Police Scotland) and seeing the massive cuts and strains on the service I can honestly say that a directly run public sector railway in Scotland would result in cost cutting on a massive scale; long term disputes between unions and management and it would lump all the risk onto the government. The franchise system is not ideal but as mentioned earlier in this thread, it provides a buffer for the government whereby they will always have someone to blame if it goes wrong - as happened last year.

 

[GrimShady]

I joined long after the BR days ended and have worked in the Public Sector prior to joining Scotrail. I believe the private sector brought about far better terms and conditions and pay to the railway - pay rises that would never have been achievable in the Public Sector.

Looking at my former public sector area (now Police Scotland) and seeing the massive cuts and strains on the service I can honestly say that a directly run public sector railway in Scotland would result in cost cutting on a massive scale; long term disputes between unions and management and it would lump all the risk onto the government. The franchise system is not ideal but as mentioned earlier in this thread, it provides a buffer for the government whereby they will always have someone to blame if it goes wrong - as happened last year.

I can see your point here but I would point out the emergency services are unable to generate any sort of income. BR was always at the mercy of whoever was in power at the time so there is consideration for that little bit of distance between both entities.

 

[jzw95]

In every other area of life, the Government and Councils are a byword for mediocre performance, cost cutting and wastefulness. Yet railways being publicly operated is seen as a panacea.

Not in the case of Lothian Buses (majority owned by City of Edinburgh Council, with Midlothian Council and East Lothian Council minority shares) or Edinburgh Trams. Both are well-regarded, particularly Lothian Buses, which has also recently picked up routes in East Lothian that First felt were uneconomic to operate.

I think the potential upside of this kind of arrangement, which has greatly benefited Lothian Buses, is that profits can be re-invested in improving the service, instead of being distributed to shareholders. But note that this model is not the Council (or SG in the case of the railways) directly running the service, but owning a company that has to run the service on a commercial basis.

 

[InOban]

It all depends on the quality of management, and if staff at all grades agree that the purpose of the business, and therefore the long-term future of it, and so their jobs, is to provide a service to the public to a quality and a price which public are prepared to pay, whether directly (fares) or indirectly (taxes).

There is however no doubt that strong unions, and the absence of national bargaining, has led to a rapid escalation in wages. When a franchise was committed to operating more trains, the cheapest to acquire the extra drivers and guards was to poach them from other operators by offering better T&Cs.

 

[link1driver]

Privatisation was bad for the industry, but good for the staff initially.

Fail to see how folk still say if the staff were better etc etc, under BR we worked 7 hour days, maybe 4 hours driving for poor pay, now it's 10 hour days, driving as much as 8 hours for better pay. I for one like my colleagues up and down the country don't give a stuff really about what sticker is on the train door, being professional and serving our public is all that really matters. It's up to the rule makers how much it costs for the journey!

I wonder if anyone would know how much subsidy BR got in it's last full year? Would be interesting to compare to what all the tocs are getting now?

 

[link1driver]

Those I work with who were around in the BR days mostly say they would not like to return to a nationalised railway.

That's the people I will listen to.

Clearly no one likes nostalgia like every other depot, money talks!