Wrongly Assumed Facts by Passengers

[ashkeba]

I think the only way you could renationalize rolling stock is by changing the method of buying new trains, and just allowing all the old stock and contracts to expire and make their way out of the system over time. It would take 30 to 40 years to resolve completely.

A government could just expropriate the ROSCOs, compensated at pennies in the pound or not at all. It's against EU law (why the far left want brexit) and would have many many other drawbacks, but it is another way of doing it.

 

[Bletchleyite]

A government could just expropriate the ROSCOs, compensated at pennies in the pound or not at all. It's against EU law (why the far left want brexit) and would have many many other drawbacks, but it is another way of doing it.

Those whose pensions are invested in the ROSCOs might not like that particular form of institutional theft, Brexit or no.

Would you like your house compulsory purchased? By the way, we'll give you a tenner for it.

 

[Journeyman]

Those whose pensions are invested in the ROSCOs might not like that particular form of institutional theft, Brexit or no.

Would you like your house compulsory purchased? By the way, we'll give you a tenner for it.

Exactly. It's the sort of thing that happened in the Soviet Union, but you absolutely can't do it in a democracy, and it's completely wrong, whichever way you look at it.

 

[ashkeba]

Exactly. It's the sort of thing that happened in the Soviet Union, but you absolutely can't do it in a democracy, and it's completely wrong, whichever way you look at it.

After the last few years, I'm no longer willing to say anything is impossible in a democracy!

The pensioners would agree because they will have been convinced by then by Pravdabooktweetgram that the state will provide better pensions in exchangefor their worthless capitalist assets.

 

[whhistle]

Although recently I did discretely tip off a passenger who had been advised by a staff member (at 13:00) to get the 13:36 to Leicester that the 13:12 London train might get him there quite a bit sooner...

Perhaps their priority when enquiring with the railway staff was that they wanted to go on a slower train thinking there would be more seats, or had no time constraints.


Always amuses me when people say "but online it said it would be X price".
Yes... online, where you looked at a single ticket price, or looked the night before at an Advance.
Not their fault but the assertion that the ticket office person is trying to rip them off is there... no wonder some people on the railway are grumpy.

 

[Eccles1983]

An easier way instead of the cries of "theft" is for the DfT buy new stock. Become an in-house Rosco

If the Rosco's want to compete then they lower the costs substantially.

Nothing beats a bit of free market principles to focus the mind.

 

[PeterC]

That rail replacement buses pick up and set down at all intermediate bus stops.

 

[Horizon22]

This, unfortunately, seems to be the thing that Jeremy Corbyn is either ignorant of or chooses to ignore. The ROSCO business model is that they'll buy the trains on long-term finance deals from the builders, that are paid for by the long-term leasing contracts they have with TOCs, so effectively new trains are pretty much built on the model of a buy-to-let landlord. ROSCOs have a vast amount of capital tied up in them, and there's absolutely no way any government could afford the billions it would cost to buy them out.

Exactly. Whilst there are some merits in nationalisation (reduction of complexity, a single overall "focus" for the railway etc.), when I ask supporters on this point, nobody has had a good answer to this point, or was unaware it was even an issue so queue stunned silences.