A FUTURE FOR RAIL

John McDonnell MP told a packed House of Commons committee room that a meeting entitled the Future for Rail “couldn’t have been more timely”. Held just a week before Gordon Brown became Prime Minister and as a government white paper on the future 30 years of rail was being prepared, John said that the event was an important opportunity “to win the campaign to grow the railway system”. In attendance was a mix of interested parties from within and outside the rail industry, including MPs, representatives of commuter campaign groups, RMT and other transport union activists. RMT general secretary Bob Crow said that while everyone could draw up what changes they wanted to see happen on the railways, the real question to ask of Parliament was “is there a will to do it?” “The issue is about a lot more than rail, it is about the buses too. Bus and rail should be complementing each other. That can’t happen because they are in competition. “We need a transport system that defeats environmental problems, we need to make it an issue in elections. Only when it is publicly owned and publicly accountable will it deliver for the people,” he told the audience. Kay Carberry, TUC assistant general secretary, said that across the trade union movement there was a commitment to long term planning of the public transport system. There was also a compelling environmental and social argument in favour of improved public transport because it affects the whole community. Questioning real government commitment to change, she pointed out that “motoring costs have decreased in real terms while rail travel has gone up in price”. She said that the TUC wanted to see a proper strategy for getting freight off of the road and onto rail and also a new high speed line linking London to the north of England and Scotland. Tony Ambrose of the train users group More Trains Less Strain said that “the whole structure needs to change”. He claimed that people didn’t want to be humiliated by travelling in cramped conditions and did not want to be “held to ransom by rapacious private monopolies”. Tony told the story of a well- supported day of action earlier in the year in the form of a fare strike when hundreds of passengers refused to buy tickets. Instead they issued spoof “cattle class” tickets to make their point. First Great Western had threatened to fine the protesters but on the day itself the size of the protest meant they just opened the barriers for the protesters at the end of their journey. Rail Minister Tom Harris MP couldn’t make the meeting as it coincided with the christening of his new son. Instead, Mark Lambirth, Department for Trade and Industry director of Rail Strategy and Finance, was a RMTnews :: august/september 2007 :: www.rmt.org.uk 12 A FUTURE FOR RAIL RMT’s Parliamentary group John McDonnell MP hosted a recent seminar on the Future for Rail Bob Crow speaks TSSA general secretary Gerry Doherty makes his point