This from the Office of Rail Regulation...
Securing better passenger information
Train operators have asked for more time to prepare for new obligations aimed at ensuring passengers receive appropriate, accurate and timely information, the Office of Rail Regulation (ORR) confirmed today.
Oh the irony!
This from First Great Western's Fastline...
InterCity Express Programme (IEP) update
On 23 September 2011 I updated you on progress about the InterCity Express Programme (IEP) and undertook to keep you informed of further developments.
Agility Trains recently let us know that Planning Permission has now been granted for their three IEP traincare depots on the Great Western network – North Pole, London; Stoke Gifford, Bristol; and Swansea.
I can also confirm, contrary to recent media reports stating a contract has been agreed, that negotiations continue between the Department for Transport and Agility Trains to finalise the IEP contract details. I understand this will now be agreed by May 2012 at the earliest.
It is anticipated that the first IEP train will enter service in early 2017, with the full IEP timetable implementation not until May 2018, more than six years from now.
We await further developments and will continue to keep you informed as we learn more about this important Department for Transport project.
A triumph of public sector procurement.
Captain Deltic asks "Who said this and when?"...
But Network Rail's remuneration committee still allowed substantial bonuses this year despite a formal letter warning that performance had been mixed. All the regulator could do was to say that he was "surprised and disappointed".
Under a Conservative Government, if the regulator is disappointed, the senior management will feel it. We will give the regulator the power to inflict real financial pain on Network Rail via the confiscation of reduction of bonuses in cases of serious under-performance.
At present, Network Rail's senior management is theoretically accountable to "members" who are supposed to function like the shareholders of a public limited company. In reality they do no such thing. The senior management can get away with scooping the bonus pool because an amorphous grouping of 100 members, the appointment of which can be vetoed by the very management team they are supposed to scrutinise, simply aren't strong enough to stop them.
So a further measure a Conservative Government would adopt to give Network Rail much stronger incentives to respond to their customers is reform of the company's governance.
We will streamline and shrink the membership to turn it into a supervisory board. We will ensure that members will be appointed independently of Network Rail's management.
And we will make sure we have people on it who will provide a strong voice for passengers and for train and freight operators, in setting the overall direction of the company and holding its management to account.
And, in addition, we will inject more contestability into areas of Network Rail's remit. At present, the company has an almost complete monopoly over publicly funded rail improvements.
Clue: It's not just promises that get broken.
UPDATE: This from The Archer...
I’m feeling pedantic so I’ll point out that no promises were broken as we don’t have a Conservative Government.
As I'm sure members of the 1922 Committee will be only too pleased to confirm...
Is uber-blogger Paul Staines a member of the Institution of Railway Operators?
In a post on his order-order blog about the the move of Labour's HQ, Guido uses the following map which rather gives the game away.
Eye thinks we should be told!
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