EXCLUSIVE: Vote for the new Chair of the Transport Select Committee!

Time for an exciting new Eye poll!

Using your skill and judgement, select who you think should be the new Chair of the Transport Select Committee.

These are the Labour runner and riders, in no particular order (I see what you did there. Ed):

• Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South); 
• Bridget Phillipson (Houghton and Sunderland South); 
• Geraint Davies (Swansea West) 
• Clive Efford (Eltham); 
• Gavin Shuker (Luton South)

Note: The honour of Chairing the Transport Select Committee falls to the Red team, in line with Parliamentary arithmetic and as agreed today (alternative colours can be found on different select committees).

The poll is on the right hand menu bar...

Remember: Vote early, vote often!

New DG Rail - Who should it be?

Time for an Exciting New Eye Poll!

With Bernadette Kelly elevated to role of Permanent Secretary the search is on for a new Director General, Rail at the DfT.

In the spirit of open-government Eye has offered to crowd source a suitable candidate!

Despite one of the candidates being somewhat busy with elections, editing the Standard, making huge amounts of money and stuff,  this is your chance to influence the future of our industry! (It really isn't. Ed).

Use your skill and judgement to select from our candidates on the righthand menu bar...

Remember, vote early - vote often!

Who will be the new MD of First/MTR SWT?

Time for an exciting Eye poll!

Using your skills and judgement select who is most likely to be new MD of First MTR South Western Trains.

The exclusive Eye poll is on the right hand side menu bar.

Remember, vote early vote often!

Eye survey cancelled - Official Statement

Following disclosure of significant failings in Eye's latest survey on IEP costs the following statement has been issued:

IEP cost comparator survey cancelled

The Fact Compiler has today announced that the survey on IEP costs has been cancelled following the discovery of significant technical flaws in the way the process was conducted.

The decision means that Railway Eye readers will no longer be able to vote on comparative costs between IEP and Pendolino vehicle diagrammes in a poll due to expire on the 31st October. It is consequently no longer contesting the judicial review sought by Mr Kipling in the High Court (Is this right!?! Ed).

The flaws uncovered relate to the way the survey process was conducted on Railway Eye. An announcement will be made later today concerning the suspension of staff while an investigation takes place.

Railway Eye is resolving urgently the future arrangements for Eye surveys and will ensure that a normal service of bile and invective continue uninterrupted. The Fact Compiler stressed today that passengers and tax payers will continue to be ill served by the Incredibly Expensive Procurement.

The Fact Compiler has also:

• ordered two independent reviews to be undertaken urgently: the first into what went wrong with the Eye poll and the lessons to be learned (note this will be significantly delayed, if it appears at all), the second into the wider use of surveys on Railway Eye, both overseen by leading business figures...

Cont' for the next 94 months at least...

Who should carry the can for the ICWC debacle?

Time for an exciting new Eye survey!

According to the Department for Transport the InterCity West Coast franchise competition has been cancelled due to "the way the procurement was conducted by department officials".

Using your skill and judgement you can help Patrick McLoughlin determine who should carry the can for this shambles?

The survey is in the usual position on the right hand menu bar... get voting!

Remember, owing to their simplicity, no "significant technical flaws" have been discovered in any Eye survey to date!
 

The race to chair NR starts here!

So. Farewell then Ricky Haystacks.

You came, showed Iain the door, installed Hurricane Higgins and yet in 10 months time you too will be gone. Now the search for your successor begins.

With such a daunting task before NR's recruitment consultants Eye is keen to be of assistance.

Therefore our latest exciting survey asks the question:

Who should chair Network Rail?

Remember - the Chairman's role is to lead the board and ensure harmonious relations with key stakeholders

So what are you waiting for - this could be your opportunity to shape the railway of tomorrow!

Here are Eye's runners and riders in the Career Development Handicap

• A Jammy Dodger

• Beau Bowker

• Captain Permatan

• Chris 'Red' Green

• Ivor the Engine

• Tom 'ACPO' Winsor

• Rail Barbie

• Slugger O'Toole

• Tinky Winky
  

Remember vote early, vote often.

UPDATE: This from @bendolino, via Twitter...

I nominate the Chanel 9 team from the Fast Show.

"OLE Speed 1? Scorchio!"

UPDATE: This from the Major...

No mention of Rob 'HS1' Holden?

Then again I'm not sure how serious Eye is about some of the names on the list.

I mean Tinky Winky for goodness sake, when are the MoD ever likely to release her?

Exciting new Eye EP Survey

In the spirit of the new internationalism, where Hitachi is apparently heading a 'British Led Consortium'...

It's time for an exciting new Eye survey!

Use your skill, judgment or Stuart Baker inspired insights to answer the following question:

"Is IEP the best HST replacement?"

Cast your vote using our leading edge technology based interactive... errr... widget opposite.

Remember: Vote early, Vote often!

Stewards enquiry shocker

This just in from Bob Poynter...

I am not convinced that David Rowlands voted for himself in your recent poll to identify who should lead high speed rail.

A far more likely explanation is that Sadie the Guide Dog put her paw on the wrong button when trying to vote for herself.

Which is of course why she is the stand out choice to lead the project.

Results of Eye's latest exciting survey

Obviously Railway Eye is now required reading within DafT's sprawling empire.

Or so it would appear from Eye's latest exciting survey (eyes right).

As usual, Eye's powerful analytical software has identified the source of the single vote, cast in favour of DfT specifying new High Speed lines...

Welcome Sir David and thank you for taking part.

Eye survey LATEST

***Purnell scratched***

Night of the long spoons

According to Xbriefing, with a bowler tip to HQ Staffer, Gordon Brown will have a "Cabinet cull... by the end of the week..."

Xbriefing then names those whose time in government is at an end:

"Transport Secretary Geoff Hoon, the Home Secretary Jackie Smith, the Chancellor of the Exchequer Alistair Darling, and the Communities Secretary Hazel Blears."

Two down (by their own hands) and two to go.

So if Hoon of that Ilk goes who will replace him?

Time for another exciting Eye survey...

Most exciting Eye survey - ever!

In May Railway Eye received 16,724 visits from 4,766 unique visitors.

Apparently you viewed 24,954 splenetic utterances in total.

So what?

So it's time to to announce the Eye's most exciting survey, ever! Click here to take part... (It'll take 30 secs - honest. Many thanks)

UPDATE: Very many thanks. Survey now complete. Normal service will resume shortly...

Hoon for Tory Transport Secretary

Oh dear.

It appears that the Shadow Secretary of State for Transport, Theresa Villiers, is also a hoon.

This from the Daily Telegraph...

Theresa Villiers claimed almost £16,000 in stamp duty and professional fees on expenses when she bought a London flat, even though she already had a house in the capital.

Who is left to trust?

Which is the very question asked in our latest, exciting, Eye survey...

Adonis multiple vote shocker!

Time to review the results of the latest exciting Eye survey.

Readers were invited to vote on whether InterCity stations should have barriers.

Everybody, with the exception of My Lord Adonis, will be unsurprised to discover that 75% of Eye readers believe that InterCity stations should remain ungated and open.

That said, 15% of you voted in favour of ticket barriers.

But what's this?

Some sort of skullduggery afoot?

Readers who voted for ticket barriers were clearly asked to confirm that they were also Lord Adonis.

Eye can only assume that Lord Adonis, or his advisors, took advantage of the tax payer funded Pilgrimage of Grice and voted from multiple IP addresses as he toured the country.

For this clear example of electoral malpractice the Eye's returning officer has decreed that only one vote can be recorded in favour of gates. Disappointing news for the department.

Perhaps the most interesting result was amongst those who confirmed that they were not listening.

This option was only visible to browsers accessing the Eye from DfT's high-level gsi domain servers.

As a consequence the Eye can exclusively reveal that a majority of civil servants, who expressed a preference, are just not listening.

No surprise there then.