Get ready for the new Railways Act

This from Louise Ellman at Thursday's Westminster Hall debate on Investment Priorities for the Railways:

The Select Committee takes rail investment extremely seriously and will give the McNulty report full consideration in due course, along with the Government's White Paper on the future of rail.

So. Petrol-head has managed to create time in the legislative timetable for a Railways Bill.

In ye olden days the convention was that a Green Paper would be issued in advance of a White Paper.

For those under the age of forty, a Green Paper was a clearly announced consultation document containing policy proposals for debate and discussion before the Government made a decision on the contents of a White Paper (a White Paper, of course, contains detailed proposals for legislation).

Eye assumes that the endeavours of McNulty and LEK constitute such a consultation.

Meanwhile the industry had better brace itself for another Tory legislative restructuring of our industry. Let us hope it is more succesful than that of 1993?

With places on Petrol-head's High Level Group as yet unfilled it will be interesting to see who will be invited to sup with the devil.

Not only will these exalted ones help shape Hammond's exciting new Railway's Bill, they will also create a structure for the industry that could last for the next twenty years.

Meanwhile, those who care about the railways, but left out in the cold by McNulty's 'industry consultation' and adrift from Hammond's HLG may take comfort from the 'Yew-turn' the ConDems were forced to execute over Forest policy this week.

After all, it's not just woodland that has branches.

Latest ABC figures show print holding up

It's ABC time again...

As Eye pointed out last year most railway titles don't submit themselves to the indignity of an ABC circulation audit, so a bowler tip to those that do.

Here the recently published 2010 circulation figures for the top three (with 2009 figures in brackets):

Railway Magazine 34,168 (34,715)

Steam Railway 32,441 (32,842)

RAIL magazine 20,006 (20,546)

Eye's man in the Dead Tree Media comments:

As all three titles recorded a roughly similar decline in circulation this suggests that readers are consolidating the number of titles they buy and that overall readership is subject to... ahem... ‘natural wastage’!

Evidently print media continues to hold its own.

UPDATE: This from Arnie the Anorak...

Of course RAIL is published every two weeks or 26 times a year, where as Railway Magazine is published 12 times a year and Steam 13 times a year.

If you then add up the total annual circulation for each publication... (that's enough gratuitous puffery for Dead Tree media. Ed).