Great Western Coffee Shop

The past few months have seen sad rumblings on one heritage railway. This has come to a head. It is worth reading to see the concerns being raised.

The context can be seen on Twitter and the comments associated with it.

https://twitter.com/joannemcrompton/status/1643878780409110533?s=61&t=VlafMC5gF9tidw36b1Y8JQ

This speech at the HRA gives further context.
https://youtu.be/-Z-fbYrNVD0

From the document with that Twitter posts


Oh dear, oh dear.

My thoughts are far wider, looking at how people who are working as volunteers or paid,  but who don't fit in in some way, are treated. There are norms for (private or public sector) employees ... and different metrics and less defined norms where the person involved are not just employees if they are employees at all - enthusiasts for a company or cause, or working as volunteers.

Heritage railways, and many other public transport support groups, have moved from being what I might characterise as a few harmless nutcases on the side to a key ingredient of the whole, which effects people's whole lives an livelihoods.  Perhaps I am writing in generalities because this hits at my personal nerve (whether or not that's justified) that there is little desire to rekindle or relive.

I have just sat through half an hour of listening to Joanne Crompton.  One of the most worthwhile half hours listening in a long time.

Yes, I listened to it a while ago. The future for heritage railways is bleak if they don't do more to accept diversity.

Either the people who run the East Lancs Railway are complete idiots or there is more to this than we're being told.  I really can't work out which though.

There are "always" (well, nearly always) two sides to a story. I do not doubt that gender is just one side of it, and the way it is portrayed in just one side. All sides need to be addressed. 

It does not lessen the story, but, folks, bear in mind we are late to it - the video is from 2021 so causal events must have been prior to that.  One hopes progress has been made since that.

Her comment about "living off of the fat of BR and the attitudes of the 1960's" sadly is based on reality of many BR departments of the 1970's and even into the 1980's when female drivers started to be trained; I know of one depot where the drivers threatened to walk out "if that bl***y woman works here" the BR management reaction was to offer her a job in Travelers Fare!  She did persist and worked an other depot but only after the threat of BR being taken to Court under the 1975 Sex Discrimination Act.  It was not just the preserve of the footplate grades in BR at that time.

That old attitude brought in by those old exBR men will have infected the attitudes of non railway men who volunteer thinking its the way a real railway is run!

I am a senior volunteer in a national charity, which has nothing to do with trains or railways", what is quite often the case regarding management in the volunteering sector people are in management rolls with no experience or training, this can extend into the Board member.   The organisation I volunteer with whilst not perfect, it does have training courses for its different levels of management but we are a National Charity with the resources that go with that, most heritage railways would not have access to such resources. 


If what she said is rife within the Heritage Railway sector then it is doomed, is it that bad on all heritage railways?

I note that the said volunteer was sacked by a lady general manager!

Her reasons for the sacking (Twitter) were... disrepute.... resources...

Too much modern management. Did the GM ever serve as a cleaner, then firewoman?

OTC

An update in photo from ELR board and link to Joannes posting of the tweet by Phil Haigh

https://twitter.com/joannemcrompton/status/1644364981742305280?s=61&t=VlafMC5gF9tidw36b1Y8JQ

I've always been sceptical of University graduates coming into any job in a senior role with no experience of the industry they are now working in.
From what I've seen over my working life, they come in with wonderful theory ideas, anyone who expresses a "but" are treated as negative thinkers and not what we need in this industry.
Better managers come through the ranks so know what does, and does not work.

There is a history of people coming into a role who do not fit the sterotype of their to-be colleagues having to put up with being picked on, targetted, discriminated against, and so on. That applies to nationallity, race, colour, religion, and age as well as gender.   And exactly because of the battles that may need to be fought, such incomers will tend to be the more determined / more bolshie / higher maintenance 'types'.  I have been aware of a number of situations over the years, and indeed I am watching a couple from the periphery at present.  It's more complex than discrimination though - there's a kickback factor where reverse discrimination comes in, and where the none-sterotype strong people play the "it's because I'm xxxx" card and management make decisions not wholly based on best-for-the-job, but rather tampered by fear of discrimination accusations. 

Please note that I make no outcome judgement on the currently highlighted case, which we see only through the evidence available online. I will say it's a sad situation (as these things usually are) for everyone concerned.

Indeed. If this was a train crash (which, figuratively speaking, it is) some of us would be urging caution and asking that we wait for the official report.

Suspect the Heritage Railway Sector is largely dominated by men of a certain age who aren't used to dealing with women, perhaps at any level, and this is the rather clumsy outcome.

Just speculation of course, but no harm in adding it to all the other speculation which largely makes up this thread  :)

Fair point, but not, I think, relevant in this instance - see above