Great Western Coffee Shop

This is a copy of the email MTLS have sent out to people:

Dear x
YOU WILL HAVE HEARD that FGW has been issued with a Remedial Notice by the DFT  in a final attempt to force FGW to deliver a decent service. Both the Remedial Plan and the Breach Notice were issued for reneging on its franchise terms by exceeding the threshold on cancellations, and then misreporting the cancellation rate.

FGW THREATENED WITH REMOVAL OF FRANCHISE
You may not have heard the rumour from a trusted source that  the DfT met FGW and said they had decided to take away their franchise.  First contested this saying that the DFT had not followed the right procedures, and that if the DfT did take away the franchise, First would seek a judicial review.

^29 MILLION - TOO LITTLE TOO LATE
Consequently FGW is to spend ^29m on staff training, better customer information, enhanced compensation (next year), more drivers and a limited amount of extra rolling stock. ^29m spread accross the whole of FGW and spent on all these areas will not produce any significant service improvement.

13 PENCE EXTRA PER PERSON PER WEEK
A blogger (Economy Klaus: http://firstlatewestern.blogspot.com/2008/02/andrew-haines-and-13-pence-solution.html) has calculated that this equates to spending by FGW of an extra 13 pence per passenger per week. Please let us know what you would like your 13 pence spent on. (Calculations based on ^29 million: divide by the 1.5 million passengers using FGW each week then divide the result again by the number of weeks between now and the end of 2010 (roughly 147)

KEEP THE PRESSURE UP
It seems unlikely that FGW willl still be running our train service in 6 months time. The DfT will now be monitoring the service more closely. It is vital to keep the pressure up on FGW and the DfT, so if your train service continues to be poor for the price you pay, please continue to complain to Ruth Kelly at the DfT and copy in your MP and your local newspaper. If you don't tell them, they will never know and you will be saddled with FGW for another 7 years.

A MESSAGE FOR ANDREW HAINES
MTLS is seeing Andrew Haines on Wednesday 19th March. If you have message that you would like us to give him, please post it on our forum.

Regards
The More Train Less Strain Team.
MTLS Towers

{http://moretrainlessstrain.co.uk/smfforum}

What do people think of "FGW won't be running our service in 6 months?" ???

Well I thought MTLS was instrumental in getting people (and in particular Govt) to wake and notice what was going on. But I think they are wrong in continuing to campaign for FGW's removal, as the problem was as much the government's making, although FGW then screwed it up badly.

I did think that the franchise breach was a convenience and excuse for the government to step in. As I understand it the breach was misreporting figures, not the fact that the service had been awful for months. But of course they couldn't "force" FGW to take action just because they had agreed an inadequate franchise specification, so they had to wait until FGW slipped up on a technicality.

I now think MTLS should give FGW a decent period of time to get its additional (whoops, nearly called it "new") stock in place, and then pass judgment.   

I wouldn't expect MTLS to do anything except take an extreme position.

Trying to sort out FGW has got to be like trying to turn round the proverbial oil tanker - Andrew Haines hasn't even been running FGW for six months yet - but there are signs out there of things being taken in hand. Dump First from the franchise now and you set back the whole process, while someone else is found to take on the job, who then has to take time to understand the problems before they can try to tackle them.

Yes, First are in the last chance saloon, but you have to give them that chance. Don't forget that in other parts of the country, they run rail services that are well thought of. These were under the overall control of Andrew Haines from July 2005, as First's UK rail division managing director, but until last autumn, FGW was specifically excluded from his remit. This may just be a coincidence, but then again it might not be. We shall see.

If I may be permitted to add my 'two pennies worth': I am a passenger, I don't work for First Great Western, and I don't think FGW losing the franchise is a realistic option. For those interested, these are among my reasons: http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=1916.msg14148#msg14148

Chris  ;)

I don't think it's likely that they'll loose the franchise in the forseeable future either, Chris - however, it's hard to foresee too far ahead, stranger things have happened, and both Sea Containers and Connex have lost franchises in the past for different reasons.  One wonders if there was a strong policical case for the government to be seen to be doing something to calm the public disquiet about services, especially bearing  in mind that national politicians have to be re-elected from time to time and want their party to do well.

I note that More Train, Less Strain also write  """Whilst we welcome more rolling stock on the Portsmouth- Cardiff route, there are shortages 7 days a week on almost all lines, with trains on several lines such as Weymouth-Frome- Bristol and Chippenham -Melksham reduced to such low service levels as to make them practcially useless.""" (see http://www.moretrainlessstrain.co.uk/ - their home page) and that helps to put the Heart of Wessex and the TransWilts high up the agenda. I'm sure that FGW want to implement a good solution to these issues. I know they (FGW) know what the solution is on the TransWilts at least, and that their solution for that also helps Frome, and the Salisbury - Warminster segment further too.

Sorry Grahame, as much as I don't get annoyed  with your continuous plugging of your prolblem, that has just annoyed me. Currently as many people roughly each day who go by train FROM/TO Melksham probababally adds up quite well to the amount of people being turned away from this Cardiff-Porstmouth line on a SUNDAY!

But I guess that's the point. There can hardly be many passengers if there isn't a service. I think Graham is campaigning for the passengers who used to be, but can't be any more.

Thank you, John.   That's exactly my point.   

In 2005, there were 120,000 journeys made. Yesterday, a total of about six people got off the train in Melksham. That's around 2000 per year - or it would be except yesterday was a good day - on Sunday 66% of trains were cancelled so the numbers were, I'm sure, lower.

Jim - would you care to join me in Melksham on a Saturday morning and talk to people in the street about their railway service, or perhaps join me at the "Party in the Park" in July where I'll be helping to man a stand?  Then you'll see the local call in this town alone - and we're just a fifth of the former use of the line.

The Cardiff - Portsmouth is high up the agenda too and is a big issue too.  And it's interrelated.   One of the pinch points in northbound from Salisbury ... and how better to provide extra capacity than to step back up to a more frequent service to Warminster and beyond.  But let me talk about my own area of experince, and you talk about your own area.  If you're annoyed about someone fighting their own corner and with full local and much wider support, and not to the detriment of other lines then - well - I'm not allowed to get personal here by my own rules  ;D


It's not just Melksham.

Trowbridge to Swindon - 95 minutes by direct bus.  40 minutes by direct train.
Chippenham to Salisbury - no direct public transport at all.
Swindon to Salisbury - over 2 hours by public transport for a 40 mile journey
The TransWilts links the five largest population centres in Wiltshire

If we believe MTLS that Fgw wil be out in 6 months..who is going to run it then?? it will be the same timetable operated with the same stock using the same staff so what is going to change?
with the units from ATW that will assist overcrowding but also the whole west fleet is being refurbished and to do this units need to be out of service.
Fgw are recruiting a lot more staff at present which will give some much needed cover but remember you cant train staff overnight and any starting now it will be 3 to 6 months before they are productive with a much longer time for Drivers.
Seems to me that MTLS now want to promote a shall i say hate campaign for the sake of it ,and not work with local stakeholders to actually try improve local rail services

SPIN SPIN and more SPIN

init funny how I have read nowt in the national or industry press about First being told that they would be having the GW franchise removed yet this muppet group have been privvy to this information!

ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! don't those muppets ever give up! Finally there's some serious signs of improvement, FAR less cancellations, less late running, less short formed trains, more units from May, more investment, more happy passengers (believe it or not ;)) and MTLS still have to talk total and utter bullsh1t, I think MTLS are clutching at straws because they've got nothing to whinge about at the moment, people aren't interested in them anymore, have you looked on their forum lately? hardly a single post since the failed fare strike, which sums it up really, Mr Ambrose seems to post here occasionally quoting a load of boll**ks but when asked to back it up he never does, because he can't. Lets face it, FGW fu**ed up, we know, but it seems that they are making an effort to turn things around since Andrew Haines took over and i'm convinced now that he can do this, I probably wouldn't have been so confident early last year, at that time I was a synical as the next person, but watch this space.....

A couple of thoughts.

First Group bid fully knowing all T & C^s and the inherent risk that if they did not meet them they would lose all rail franchises. I have no sympathy with any company which would expose themselves (and shareholders) to that amount of risk without fully understanding what it was they were taking on. As events have proved they were wholly incompetent in that regard, therefore they didn^t do their homework and so should be sent straight up to bed without any supper. (and without any train franchises). It will be interesting to see what the response to Alstom pulling out of ICE programme will be as they are probably the premier European high speed train builders. I just wish all the bidders had withdrawn from the West franchise from the outset.

Did Moir believe ^his man^ on the inside would not let it get this far?

http://www.christianwolmar.co.uk/articles/rail/509.shtml

Passengers will not be unduly inconvenienced with the Government being the final operator, all current contracts will have to be fulfilled, and all staff retained, it^ll just take a little while for the wonks in DafT to realise there is a lunatic running the asylum and then they^ll get on with sorting out decent specifications with at least some decent customer input.

The 13p/passenger statistic is interesting, and as has been pointed out the old Wessex area will still be worse off even after stock addition with no decent cross Wiltshire service and the nightmare summer Weymouth service yet to come. Seems to me that First still have some real work to do to actually meet staff and customer aspirations, and it ain^t under the current franchise.

Weymouth will be having 67's+coaches again this summer, I do agree with the jist of what you say above, but my point is that things are getting better, if FGW loose the franchise then the passengers will see a decline, as all the investment will stop, it will be run on even more of a shoestring than now, it will still be the same trains, tracks, managers, staff and timetable, Transwilts would DEFINATELY not get any improvements, fares would still go up at the agreed rate etc etc...

I'm not so sure that Weymouth will be getting 67s and LHCS this year - every time I've tried to confirm whether the safety case allows booked paths (ie, not 1Zxx) First have either said "err, erm, errrrrr, yes......" or "erm, not sure". Not very definite!

they will be run as "zulu's", trust me, have I let you all down yet with my info???  ;)

What bugged me about First getting this franchise was their franchise application boast along the lines of "we have local knowledge because we've been operating trains in this area". Hmmm. What precise local knowledge did they have? 

Local knowledge? well they used to run Great Western Trains before which just happened to be pretty local

I have to agree with John R, sorry Vacman. When the national media report our problems they always mention the fare strike. Well done to the people who did take part, they have to take some credit for the extra carriages which are now being promised. As previously mentioned in other threads FGW won't lose the franchise whilst they still agree to pay the govt all those payments (sorry they fleece the passengers in order to pay the govt).

And who first devised such a stupid system for running a public system.

Errr

The Government perhaps?

Sorry, but your missinformed, the wheels were in motion for the extra units from Arriva in November last year, the fare strike was in January this year, yeah, nice to see youare condoning the people who verbally assaulted the gateline staff at various stations, the fare strike that all the herberts jumped on the back of to faredodge on another day.

precisely Vacman.....

Precisely - so how come they get so much wrong with their 'local knowledge'? Why didn't they anticipate all the overcrowding on Bristol services and Thames Valley services? Droves of people didn't suddenly start using the trains on the day they started the entire GW franchise.

Gosh, quite a few responses to my post!

I have to say, that MTLS's comment about FGW loosing the franchise within 6 months is absolute rubbish.

Look- they are getting back on track. New 158s coming soon, with an HST following after.

And in a way, the 180 being sent away is getting FGW an HST (via Hull Trains and East Midlands Trains!).

I have to say, for the first time, I am optimistic....

I think they deserve a chance to prove themselves, one last chance. My gripe is with the way MTLS behave, if FGW became the best operator in the world overnight then MTLS would find fault!

Steve......at risk of repeating something that has been stated about 100 times on here... FGW bid to run the Franchise on information from Daft... you will run this many trains using this amount of Rolling Stock.
Basically they both screwed up and underestimated demand.

Just about sums up the whole thing nicely I think.

MTLS are correct in that there has been NO Service Improvements, with more passengers travelling FGW need to run MORE Trains with more stock just to reinstate the Wessex Days level of Service, and to restore to earlier levels is NO Improvement.

One small improvement made by FGW is the installing of Ticket Barriers at main Stations, but these should have been installed in the 1990's, but never were because whilst First may have seen a small rise in Fares NE would have seen a much bigger raise from collected local fares, that just stinks.

Ummmm, yeah, so like its been pointed out 100's of times ITS THE DFT!!!! the service is a vast improvement on what the DFT wanted, so yes, there are service improvements.

In some cases they should revert to the Wessex Timetable (TransWilts?)!!  ;)

As has also been pointed out 100's of times, it was not all the DfT. See below for a good background link.
http://indefenceoffirstgreatwestern.blogspot.com/2007/11/answering-some-questions.html

dog box's earlier quote is close enough to the truth for me, as it states that they both screwed up and underestimated demand. The only real difference I have with it is (as Insider admits in the above link) that FGW did make some cuts above and beyond what they had to do.

I also draw your attention to a quote by me in response to Insider :

Indeed - that action by First Great Western was the pits.   The specification from the DfT was dreadful enough was designed to provide a decent commuter trip into Swindon - 08:15 in, 17:45 out, but FGW extended that by 90 minutes (getting the DfT to modify the spec in the process) and making the day impractically long.  I know people who gave up working because of FGW.

P.S.  Then the remaining two trains get put on at silly times ... 06:18 off Swindon, back at 20:20 when the business case was much better for 08:30 off Swindon and 17:30 back ... and that would have tied in operationally with the other two trains.

For all those who point the Blame of the Mess that FGW became at the DfT, just remember that FGW should have done their Homework and checked passenger loadings on former Wessex Operated trains.
They would have been able to correct the DfT's outdated figures, (never trust a body run by civil servants)

Whilst overcrowding occurs on many areas of FGW, it's the former Wessex Services that have seen the worse problems, 3 car trains cut to 2, or Train service cuts such as Melksham has seen.