We would not want to return to the days when the transport secretary was actively engaged in the running of the railways, down to what the last wheel-tapper was paid. Nevertheless, Patrick McLoughlin’s answer when invited to condemn the £5 million bonuses which could be on offer to Network Rail directors over the next three years is a depressing comment on everything that is wrong with the railway industry. ‘It is not something I have interfered with because it is a private company,’ he said.
Network Rail is a private company of sorts, but it is one which is 100 per cent owned by the taxpayer. If the Transport Secretary is not prepared to speak up on behalf of its 60 million shareholders, then who is? The company exists in a kind of limbo, free from accountability and responsibility. It need fear neither the wrath of Mr McLoughlin nor of its customers, who have no choice in whether to use its services because there is no competition. If you want to take a mainline train in Britain, like it or lump it, you are going to have to hand over money, indirectly, to Network Rail.
Nor, with the exception of a few towns fortunate enough to be served by more than one line, do passengers have any choice when it comes to choosing their train operating company. This goes a long way to explaining why commuters next January will face average fare rises of 4.1 per cent, with some fares rising by 9 per cent — and this for a service which will in many cases involve week after week of delays and overcrowding.
The experience of the rail industry in the nearly two decades since privatisation proves something which should have been obvious: private monopolies are no better than state-owned ones.
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