UNIONS attacked the government’s “shambolic management” of the railways following a damning report by the Whitehall spending watchdog.
The National Audit Office (NAO) said most of the work by the Department for Transport (DfT) to overhaul Britain’s railways is delayed, with only “limited progress” on transformation plans published in 2021.
The majority of the changes and expected savings are not expected to happen until “at least the next parliament,” it added.
Britain’s rail system “needs to change” as its performance is “not good enough” for passengers and the cost to taxpayers is “too high,” the watchdog said, with the DfT spending £3.1 billion on subsidising train services in the 2022-23 financial year.
RMT general secretary Mick Lynch said: “This report confirms that both passengers and the taxpayer have been victims of the government’s shambolic management of our railways.”
He said the network has “lurched from crisis to crisis” after ministers promised reforms in 2018, adding: “The government’s fixation with protecting the vested interests of privatisation at the expense of rail staff and rail users means that they are incapable of reforming our railway.
“We need a new approach to create a publicly owned railway which will deliver a better deal for passengers, workers and the taxpayer.”
Aslef general secretary Mick Whelan, whose union represents train drivers, said: “We find it stunning that there have been no formal talks with the government or the DfT on rail reform and that the NAO spoke to just 10 stakeholders, none of them representing the workers in our industry.
“Even odder is that the report highlights fragmentation as one of the causes of inefficiency, but the government’s latest draft Bill only promotes more of the same.”
He suggested that the Tories are using the legislation as “camouflage” for worsening the terms and conditions of staff in the rail industry and cover for a “scorched-earth policy of managed decline, with investment, jobs, and wages being attacked to keep the privateers’ snouts in the public trough. It’s wrong.”
A DfT spokesperson said: “We have laid out a clear plan for the industry’s future under [proposed public-sector body] Great British Railways in our recently published draft Bill and we are now pressing ahead with improvements that will benefit millions of customers, like expanding pay-as-you-go ticketing, piloting simpler fares and announcing a target for rail freight growth.”
