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Today, a woman from the Women’s Institute of Tutshill, Gloucestershire, made a wonderful protest outside the Houses of Parliament in Westminster by sitting in a bath of milk. The protest was about the declining price of milk (down now only to 18p per litre for the dairy farmer from 24.5p ten years ago).

We only have about 13,000 dairy farmers left in Britain and there is a very real danger of losing all milk production in a few years time. The Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) are making a piddly £1.3m available to dairy farmers to “address issues of efficiency.” Defra refuse to introduce a milk regulator and insist price negotiations should be a private commercial matter that government cannot get involved in so long as competition rules are being adhered to, however they continue to increase the burden of rules and regulations onto dairy farmers who cannot take the burden of the cost anymore. (more…)

Ed Vaizey, Conservative MP for Wantage managed to secure a parliamentary debate on First Great Western’s questionable service. While many MPs who have been petitioned by their constituents were not present at the debate, at least this is a start. Whether there will be a finish I do not know.

My MP, Robert Key (Conservative) for Salisbury, has been very responsive to my emails about the problems with the service cuts introduced by FGW last December, and in the latest correspondence he assured me he had already signed two of the Commons motions raising the issue of FGW’s bad service and will be writing to the Minister responsible for service level agreements on behalf of his contituents regarding the problem.

Yesterday in Parliament, FGW’s performance was raised in Prime Minister’s Questions (Wednesday 24 January 2007), Dr Doug Naysmith, MP for Bristol North West (Labour), tabled a question to Prime Minister Tony Blair regarding the poor performance of First Group’s buses and trains. He described them: ‘disastrous commuter trains and unreliable and expensive buses.’

The Prime Minister’s reply was unsurprisingly bland and non-commital. Read the Hansard transcript.

…according to Rail Chiefs.

It’s weird how it’s ok for trains to be over-crowded but not cars or planes…

This is First Great Western’s Vision for their company:-

“Our vision is to be the leading train company and our customers’ preferred choice of travel. Our people, through their passion, energy and commitment, will provide customers and communities with travel that is safe, reliable and enjoyable.”

Preferred choice? Can any tell me what choice there is? A treacherous A36 between Salisbury and Southampton with hideous amounts of traffic and difficult parking at either end, an eternity on a bus that makes you feel sea-sick, or my preferred choice of paying large sums for a train that doesn’t turn up.

It goes on:-

“We will achieve this by exceeding your expectations of journeys by train.

From first contact to arrival at the final destination, we will make certain that journeys with us are comfortable and secure, easy and reliable, and that as a customer you feel welcomed and valued.”

Cornwall lost services on two of its branch lines for an entire week to salve the cuts made in the Bristol area. They said it was only for a week, but is this not setting a bad precedent?

The cuts and bad service I have been discussing seem to be the product of badly written franchise agreements, greedy directors and shareholders and a government who doesn’t want the problem of creating an excellent train service, save to keep feeding people into London which - the Department for Transport’s only priority for the railways. To hell with the rest of us.

In my correspondence with Passenger Focus, the rail passengers representative body, they said:

3 January 2007

“Some of the reasoning behind this change is because of a Government initiative where there is a clause added to First Great Western’s franchise agreement. This clause basically means that they must provide extra capacity to the severely overcrowded London routes. As the extra capacity needed have come from elsewhere, services such as yours have had carriages or even services removed. While I do understand why this has needed to be introduced, I can also see where this is in turn creating problems for other parts of the country.”

The PF representative went on to say:

“We feel that the long term solution to solving the rolling stock problem is investment, but accept that at this point in time train operators have to do what they can to manage the stock they have within the individual financial climate of their franchise.”

I am currently investigating current profit margins and other financial aspects of the First Great Western franchise. They claim they are investing 2 million pounds in the network. I think this is a piddling amount after what they spend on unecessary advertising and the payout to directors and shareholders.

If you want to be part of the discussions about the state of the railways, why not particupate in the User Forum of the Save the Train campaign.

You may have heard or read about the recent cuts made to services on First Great Western’s network in South West England. This has affected my journeys to and from Salisbury and Southampton with many services cancelled or severely delayed. I reported my disappointment to Salisbury Journal who covered the story as Rail Passenger Fury Over Rises. The changes came in in the Winter timetable 2006/07. I would like to publish some of the correspondence I have had with various parties including FGW here and use this blog to support campaigns such as Save the Train. Today, FGW issued an apology of sorts, reported by the BBC here. Over 900 people have signed a petition about the appalling service to 10 Downing Street. Why not join us? (more…)

There’s no eloquent way of putting this but are you fed-up of being kept on hold on an expensive non-geographic 0870 number usually waiting to complain about something that isn’t your fault and being made to pay for the pleasure? The reason the cost of these phone calls is so much higher than normal calls is because the company you are phoning takes a cut of all calls made to them.
Say no to 0870 is an excellent website that lists many land-line numbers of commonly used companies including banks and utilities. Use them.