Great Western Coffee Shop

I may be a bit late on this.   Never mind, I'm sure there will be another change in the not too distant future  :'(

Dear David, Ed, Nick and Nigel,

Rail transport infrastructure and operation is planned in decades - and yet transport ministers come and go on an annual basis, and governments work in five year cycles where they need a positve outcome and sentiment at the end of each cycle.   However, such medium term outcome needs are often inefficient and will lead in the long term to a less than optimum network for passengers, for the taxpayer, for business and the economy, for the staff and for the companies financing, maintaing and operating the network and its facilities and services.

Here are some of the issues, some of which you'll already be painfully aware of:

* Rolling electrification
* 24 x 7 services and leveling out the peaks
* A fair and understandable basis for fares
* Balancing speed and capacity, local, regional and long distance travel
* An end to costly accounting such as blame attribution
* Journey and ticket integration and information, including other transport modes
* The challenges of rising fuel costs and reducing CO2
* Rebuilding a Victorian Architecture for the reign of King Charles and even King George
* Involving passengers and the wider community in ownership and pride in the railways
* Making long use of exisitng and future trains
* Protecting revenue economically and without intimidation of honest customers
* Balancing high capacity and high comfort and facilites in trains, and luggage, wheelchairs and cycles too.

By appointing a crossbench member of the House of Lords to the role of rail minister, currently vacant and with agreement between the major parties to leave that person in place even through to a new parliament, whichever of you leads the government, you could elevate the position above politics and provide a very real chance to do provide a solid start for the long term.

A candidate for the role? Most people who work in the rail industry are excellent and dedicated - you might consider one of them; you'll certainly need someone who respects them and is respected by (or would grow to be respected by) them.  Someone who's not afraid to point out bad news as well as good, and explain it thoroughly and understandably. Someone with the vision of a strategy, and with the ability to update tactics to reach the ultimate goals.  I didn't, as I wrote this, have any one specific candidate in mind; it's possible that the person selected would need to be elevated to the Lords.

Please - be brave, and appoint a long term minister to help achieve what are common goals across the political spectrum - an efficient rail transport system that's fair, modern, good for business, good for the taxpayer, and good for passengers and staff

Replacing Simon Burns is Baroness (Susan) Kramer

Norman Baker also gone (to the Home Office) - no replacement yet announced

The new make-up at the Department for Transport is:

Secretary of State: Patrick McCloughlin (Con). Unchanged.
Minister of State: Baroness Susan Kramer (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baroness_Kramer) (LibDem). Replacing Simon Burns (Con) who intends to run for Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons.
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State: Robert Goodwill (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Goodwill) (Con). Replacing Norman Baker (LibDem) who moves to the Home Office and is promoted to Minister of State.
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State: Stephen Hammond (Con). Unchanged.

On the opposition benches, Labour have appointed Mary Creagh (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Creagh) as Shadow Secretary of State for Transport, a straight swap with Maria Eagle who moves to Shadow Secretary of State for the Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

Kramer looks like an interesting choice - with her interests in infrastructure and finance, I imagine she'll be part of the effort to beef up the case for HS2 - though I get the feeling she's unlikely to be entirely uncritical, which is probably no bad thing...

Indeed ... I wrote my letter at the top before the names were announced and - well - who knows?

Susan Kramer has some form as well. She shadowed transport on two occasions for the LibDem front bench team between 2007-2009.

The DfT however really should remove the revolving door at Great Minster House.

BBC news reports that it is Robert Goodwill who is Transport No 2, replacing Simon Burns with special emphasis for HS2. I see he owns a steam lorry..or do they mean Elizabeth the steam bus ?

Not to be confused with the steam bus, Susan Kramer seems to be the new No 3 as she is described as the Junior Transport minister, replacing 'Stormin' Norman Baker...

Stephen Hammond remains bottom of the pile.

Whereas No10 via gov.uk reports that Susan Kramer is No 2 at the DfT and Robert Goodwill is a Parliamentary Under Secretary. That's where I got my information for my earlier post.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/ministerial-appointments-7-october-2013

Who's right?

Robert Goodwill definitely has the HS2 portfolio.

If the anti HS2 lobby get after the new minister ..will it be Goodwill Hunting.

And if the noble Susan  has a conflict of interests.. will it be Kramer v Kramer ?

Ladies and Gentleman, chuffed is here all week. Try the chicken in a basket.  ;D

Seems all sorted now. The noble Baroness is the Minister of State and responsible for Phase 2 of HS2 and the luckless Goodwill is the Parliamentary under secretary dogsbody with responsibility for Phase 1 of HS2.

Still there (physically) ... it was the venue for the ACoRP briefing last week - a very informative day for Lee and me which has great benefits on helping us forward with supporting the TransWilts train service.   You will already have seen some reports posted that benefit from the day, and no doubt there are more to come  ;D