90% of Network Rail workers expect a major accident to happen in the next 2 years due to cost cutting

[Bald Rick]

These cuts include abandoning track renewals for at least the next 5 years

These cuts mean Network Rail will not renew a single mile of track for the next 5-8 years

This is absolute bo**ocks. There will be billions spent in track renewals in the next 5 years. Why do the RMT make things up like this? It’s no wonder they get some people’s backs up.

 

[Annetts key]

This is absolute bo**ocks. There will be billions spent in track renewals in the next 5 years. Why do the RMT make things up like this? It’s no wonder they get some people’s backs up.

So why is there a consultation on substantially reducing the size of the High Output organisation?

 

[jayah]

So why is there a consultation on substantially reducing the size of the High Output organisation?

The renewals budget is being reduced by 0.9% in cash terms for CP7 vs. CP6. That is a world away from stopping all renewal activity, as was suggested above, or even a holiday.

 

[greatkingrat]

So why is there a consultation on substantially reducing the size of the High Output organisation?

Reducing is not the same as Nothing.

 

[Krokodil]

Reducing is not the same as Nothing.

Is "better than nothing" really good enough?

 

[matt_world2004]

Might I ask why?

Over the last month or so there have been almost daily track faults on the gwml requiring speed restrictions and other mitigation measures, ot only takes one to not be discovered for their to be a serious incident

 

[Somewhere]

Over the last month or so there have been almost daily track faults on the gwml requiring speed restrictions and other mitigation measures, ot only takes one to not be discovered for their to be a serious incident

Indeed. We have to be lucky all the time. Fate only has to be lucky once

 

[507020]

It was only this week that my train was over 20 minutes late due to a broken rail, something I have not encountered previously and then I found it terminated 2 stops short of my destination, leaving me and several other passengers stranded without another train for over 2 hours, other than for the station being on a main bus route.

The rapid deterioration we are experiencing would be blatantly obvious even without these survey results. There have been reports of broken rails almost every day when these incidents were never normally this frequent.

 

[BrummieBobby]

I would like to think (as a non rail worker) that people have confidence in their colleagues.

This ‘expecting one soon’ is not only morbid but also expresses no confidence in the abilities of the well trained individuals who are out in all weathers ensuring the safety of our network!
Shame on the doubters. I for one get on a train most days with confidence that a rule book (written in blood!) keeps us all safe.

I hope that you are correct, but given what I see on a daily basis on my part of the network, I have serious concerns regarding maintenance and safety.

PWay, S&T and Off Track have all seen cut backs, faults are taking longer and longer to restore, signallers are having to implement degraded working far more often and for far longer than is acceptable. I recently spoke to a member of PWay staff at a location outside of my normal working area; he stated that, out of a theoretical roster of 38 men, there were 4 available for duty on that day due to leave, sick and vacancies; that is more than a little worrying.

I have stated for some time that if the travelling public could see the state of parts of the network, they would be shocked.

 

[Y Ddraig Coch]

Is "better than nothing" really good enough?

Yes when track in some places is almost 100 years old, and extra year or two wont hurt. crossings, signalling etc I agree, no, but track replacement in most places, can wait.

 

[Sly Old Fox]

I’ve had colleagues go part time just to reduce the chance of being involved in the big incident that’s coming.

 

[jagardner1984]

I think this is all part of why there is considerable thought the Tories will not necessarily be too distraught at a “period in opposition” - such is the scale of the cuts due in the next parliament, and the anticipation (which they are trying to dampen considerably at the moment) that Labour will turn back on the taps ….

However, two things seem to be uncontroversial regardless of the sample size …. Four eyes are simply more likely to spot a problem than two, and thus reduced staffing can only make some form of safety issue “more likely” …. And that in a declining Victorian asset, none of the maintenance matters will improve by another 5 years of being battered by the elements and on some extremely heavily utilised lines, and therefore the costs stored for the future will grow considerably, and that logically, the possibility of some form of issue with infrastructure that was due to be replaced (ie had been identified as End of Life) and will now be delayed, can only increase, and is thus “more likely”

I’m sure, tabloid headline writers aside, that most good thinking RMT members dread the moment that they read of some incident affecting others in the railway family, or indeed the public, and it is hard to conclude on the simple logical basis above, that the majority of responders to the poll in stating the general view that something being maintained or renewed is generally going to function better than something which is not, are anything other than completely correct.

 

[Bald Rick]

So why is there a consultation on substantially reducing the size of the High Output organisation?

Reducing high output does not equal “not renewing a single mile of track for the next 5-8 years”

There are contributors to this forum who have been responsible for renewing hundreds of miles of track between them, and not one yard of it was with High Output.

 

[godfreycomplex]

Though I suppose that someone will pop up in a minute to allege that Mick Lynch has been sneaking out at night to put up TSR warning boards at random.

Hahahaha!!

 

[43066]

I hope that you are correct, but given what I see on a daily basis on my part of the network, I have serious concerns regarding maintenance and safety.

PWay, S&T and Off Track have all seen cut backs, faults are taking longer and longer to restore, signallers are having to implement degraded working far more often and for far longer than is acceptable. I recently spoke to a member of PWay staff at a location outside of my normal working area; he stated that, out of a theoretical roster of 38 men, there were 4 available for duty on that day due to leave, sick and vacancies; that is more than a little worrying.

I have stated for some time that if the travelling public could see the state of parts of the network, they would be shocked.

Agreed. It does feel like the network is being allowed to deteriorate somewhat - the MML has never been rougher, despite the ongoing electrification. ESRs and TSRs seem to appear more, take longer to deal with, and landslips/flooding etc. are becoming more common.

The point raised in the press release is a good one,
so it’s disappointing that people reflexively seek to discredit it just because it’s from the RMT.

 

[DerekC]

This seems to be in danger of degenerating into a slanging match about words and the RMT. Aren't we missing the serious question behind all this? There seems to be no doubt that NR is cutting the maintenance and renewal budget. Unless you believe that the cuts can all be absorbed through efficiency improvements, the consequences will be either reduced reliability or reduced safety or both, with very likely increased costs in the long term. Do forum members believe (as RMT members appear to do) that safety is actually being compromised?

 

[Bantamzen]

Agreed. It does feel like the network is being allowed to deteriorate somewhat - the MML has never been rougher, despite the ongoing electrification. ESRs and TSRs seem to appear more, take longer to deal with, and landslips/flooding etc. are becoming more common.

The point raised in the press release is a good one,
so it’s disappointing that people reflexively seek to discredit it just because it’s from the RMT.

For me its not so much what has been said, but how. Surely if there really are serious issues then specific details need to be raised, not a survey? In fact if it is so serious, why have they waited until now? Why wasn't this part of the dispute, I mean if things are as bad as this then their member's lives are on the line? Sorry but its p*** poor from the RMT, it looks like a stunt, it quacks like a stunt, it is a stunt, even if behind it there are really serious issues.

 

[Krokodil]

For me its not so much what has been said, but how. Surely if there really are serious issues then specific details need to be raised, not a survey? In fact if it is so serious, why have they waited until now? Why wasn't this part of the dispute, I mean if things are as bad as this then their member's lives are on the line? Sorry but its p*** poor from the RMT, it looks like a stunt, it quacks like a stunt, it is a stunt, even if behind it there are really serious issues.

It was part of the dispute, but there was no stopping NR from going ahead with "Modernising Maintenance".

 

[md2016]

As someone whose job is to run large scale surveys, I sighed when I saw the first line.

Sure, you might be able to randomly draw a sample of 1000 railway workers and have enough confidence that it represents the population. But not a volunteer sample of a group of union members whose jobs rely on the government to take this more seriously.

It would be like asking the small percent of BNP migration workers what their view of immigration policy is, and claiming they represent the whole. You need to prove your sample is representative first.

The correct way to phrase this is that 90 percent (+\- margin of error) of RMT railway workers reported they feel government cuts are increasing the likelihood of an accident.

 

[DerekC]

For me its not so much what has been said, but how. Surely if there really are serious issues then specific details need to be raised, not a survey? In fact if it is so serious, why have they waited until now? Why wasn't this part of the dispute, I mean if things are as bad as this then their member's lives are on the line? Sorry but its p*** poor from the RMT, it looks like a stunt, it quacks like a stunt, it is a stunt, even if behind it there are really serious issues.

Then if you accept there are serious issues, why are learned members of this forum wasting all of our time disputing about whether or not this is an RMT stunt?

As someone whose job is to run large scale surveys, I sighed when I saw the first line.

Sure, you might be able to randomly draw a sample of 1000 railway workers and have enough confidence that it represents the population. But not a volunteer sample of a group of union members whose jobs rely on the government to take this more seriously.

It would be like asking the small percent of BNP migration workers what their view of immigration policy is, and claiming they represent the whole. You need to prove your sample is representative first.

The correct way to phrase this is that 90 percent (+\- margin of error) of RMT railway workers reported they feel government cuts are increasing the likelihood of an accident.

And another comment on exactly how many deck chairs there are! Is there an iceberg or not?

 

[md2016]

And another comment on exactly how many deck chairs there are! Is there an iceberg or not?

No idea. But to seriously find out, I'd recommend asking a range of people on board, rather than only speaking with the 10 members of the 'we're going to crash into an iceberg' cult, and then claiming they represent the views of the ship.

 

[Bantamzen]

It was part of the dispute, but there was no stopping NR from going ahead with "Modernising Maintenance".

What I mean is why wasn't more made of this if it was such a concern to the RMT. It would certainly have brought the NR part of the dispute more into focus, and shifted the public perception away from it being just about pay.

Then if you accept there are serious issues, why are learned members of this forum wasting all of our time disputing about whether or not this is an RMT stunt?

Well take this line for a start:

"These stats are truly shocking and show that the cuts being made by Network Rail in Scotland over the next two years are unacceptable.". Erm, stats? Don't they mean the opinion of a few of the union's membership. Now if they were to come up with £xx million cut from vital maintenance work meaning important safety repairs such as xxx & xxx are delayed or cancelled, people might sit up and take notice. But instead the RMT are trying to generate a shock response from a fairly weak data point, i.e. the results of a survey. Its little more than clickbait to be honest.

As I said if there really is a serious problem, and I'm not saying there isn't, a full blown report citing details would get a much better response than this, well I can't call it anything but a stunt to stay in the news, which has thus far failed.

 

[DerekC]

No idea. But to seriously find out, I'd recommend asking a range of people on board, rather than only speaking with the 10 members of the 'we're going to crash into an iceberg' cult, and then claiming they represent the views of the ship.

Well yes. But maybe deck chairs aren't the right analogy - anyway it wouldn't be any good asking the passengers! What somebody should be doing is counting the accident precursor incidents (like rail breaks) and seeing if the number is increasing. And of course any reliability failure impacting train movement carries some risk from a safety point of view because it puts the system into a less safe mode. "Fail safe" may have been a good concept when the background level of safety wasn't very high anyway, but it isn't acceptable to rely on it now. For instance the occasional passenger fatality from climbing out of a stranded train wouldn't have made headlines in the 1950s, but it certainly would now.

 

[Krokodil]

No idea. But to seriously find out, I'd recommend asking a range of people on board, rather than only speaking with the 10 members of the 'we're going to crash into an iceberg' cult, and then claiming they represent the views of the ship.

I'd sooner exercise caution than blindly go along with the "this ship is unsinkable" narrative. Particularly when the fractured metalwork is already in evidence.

 

[md2016]

Well yes. But maybe deck chairs aren't the right analogy - anyway it wouldn't be any good asking the passengers! What somebody should be doing is counting the accident precursor incidents (like rail breaks) and seeing if the number is increasing. And of course any reliability failure impacting train movement carries some risk from a safety point of view because it puts the system into a less safe mode. "Fail safe" may have been a good concept when the background level of safety wasn't very high anyway, but it isn't acceptable to rely on it now. For instance the occasional passenger fatality from climbing out of a stranded train wouldn't have made headlines in the 1950s, but it certainly would now.

I'd sooner exercise caution than blindly go along with the "this ship is unsinkable" narrative. Particularly when the fractured metalwork is already in evidence.

My point isn't to say the point is substanceless. It's the misuse of statistics (and lack of education around statistics, and especially distributions, samples, populations and confidence intervals at school), which breaks down the quality of debate in the country. One side gets riled up, one side turns away and we don't get very far.

Given the importance of safety, I think RMTs point would still stand if they said we spoke to X number of members of our union on the front line and Z% (+/- margin of error in footnotes) have expressed fears about the safety of the railways.

In reality, although more expensive, it would be far more impactful to pay an independent research agency to gather views across the industry (members and non members) and pull in data on incidents, repairs, cost etc to back it up.

 

[RailWonderer]

I think if maintenance budgets were cut or frozen you would more likely see suspended lines, reduced services or TSRs than more lax maintenance and accidents more frequently. There are procedures in place that weren't in place in the late 90s early 2000s. Fear mongering will always happen almost as an attention cry from some in the industry.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

The ORR Railway Safety organisation has 75 staff spread across UK to undertake oversight of NR & TOCs. On top of this NR has its own internal assurance processes which take up a fair amount of time every year to look below the surface to identify any areas where shortcomings maybe occurring. These audits are designed to provide early warning of underlying issues. Also discipline engineers have to sign off annually on their levels of compliance in their area and any would be foolish not use that as an opportunity to reinforce to senior mgt any concerns as the next level up can't get closure if it has outstanding actions.

RMT have reps on health & safety councils so rather than using a loaded questionnaire why don't they cite specific examples to illustrate their concerns.

 

[Krokodil]

My point isn't to say the point is substanceless. It's the misuse of statistics (and lack of education around statistics, and especially distributions, samples, populations and confidence intervals at school), which breaks down the quality of debate in the country. One side gets riled up, one side turns away and we don't get very far.

Maybe, but all of this quibbling about statistics and surveys (not to mention the posts that essentially say "it's RMT so it can't be true" is distracting from the real issue - the fact that the infrastructure is falling apart. TSRs are multiplying, faults aren't getting fixed. There was a points failure this morning with no S&T to attend because the nearest depot were short-staffed, with the next nearest depot dealing with a different fault.

I think if maintenance budgets were cut or frozen you would more likely see suspended lines, reduced services or TSRs

We already are seeing that on the GWML and elsewhere. Each broken rail that gets detected is a near-miss. They're occuring so frequently now that the odds of having one that doesn't get detected in time have risen substantially.

 

[Somewhere]

I think if maintenance budgets were cut or frozen you would more likely see suspended lines, reduced services or TSRs than more lax maintenance and accidents more frequently. There are procedures in place that weren't in place in the late 90s early 2000s. Fear mongering will always happen almost as an attention cry from some in the industry.

We are seeing suspended lines and reduced services, TSRs, ESRs (and cautioning because there aren't the staff available to put warning boards out)
There will be more accidents - they're just around the corner. They're coming next

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

We already are seeing that on the GWML and elsewhere. Each broken rail that gets detected is a near-miss. They're occuring so frequently now that the odds of having one that doesn't get detected in time have risen substantially.

Railways have suffered from rail fatigue from inception and thats why they have made massive use of ultrasonic detection equipment to find the rail flaws so they can be managed before they become failures. Not sure you can treat them as a near miss unless they break without prior detection.