Letter from Great Western Railway Managing Director Mark Hopwood

[whole diary]

[Timmer]

A letter from Mark Hopwood to the Cotswold Line Promotion Group has recently been published on their website with agreement from Mark Hopwood with regards to the recent service problems.

Although it talks about the issue from a North Cotswold perspective, it also has a very great deal of relevance all the way to Brighton and Penzance:

http://www.clpg.org.uk/blog/cotswold-line-service-problems-a-response-from-gwr/

I found the link to the letter on UK^▸ (United Kingdom) Rail Forums where the shortage of rail crew on the GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) rail network is also being discussed.

[broadgage]

"jam tomorrow" but at least the letter gives some interesting and relevant details as to how this jam is to be provided.

I suspect that the letter might be the first official admission that reliability and availability of the new DMUs^▸ (Diesel Multiple Unit) has fallen below that expected. I was beginning to think that only a few old dinosaurs like me had doubts, and that officially all was going splendidly.

[IndustryInsider]

There, Mark, a full and frank letter describing the problems and outlining what you are doing to resolve them.  You see you can do it!

[phile]

I still think the contents of the letter should have been made public across the whole of GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) and not just confined to a Cotswold Group

[SandTEngineer]

Yes, but have you actually read it properly.  Focus will be on Cotswold services, and stuff everywhere else.....

[nickswift99]

Have any other groups had similar letters? Are they also going to get a focus?

[JayMac]

This should be addressed to every GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) customer, addressing the issues faced across the entire GWR network.
Front and centre on the GWR website, on social media channels and YouTube.

It's not good enough to be only seen to respond to those who have an easier route to contact with the MD. Even then, the first thing Mr Hopwood is doing is apologising for his own tardy response. If he can't get a handle on his own correspondence what chance him being able to get GWR back on track?

The buck stops with him. He needs to be seriously considering his position.

[Timmer]

Yes, but have you actually read it properly.  Focus will be on Cotswold services, and stuff everywhere else.....

Well I guess it’s been written to cater for those with whom it was written to. If it was being written to those in South Wales it would be differently worded. In my view behind the North Cotswold line its South Wales that has suffered the most from cancellations and running short due to train crew issues of late.

[Gordon the Blue Engine]

I think what is lacking in Mark Hopwood’s letter is some recognition and appreciation of the efforts being made by GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) staff to keep the show on the road on a daily basis, despite the failings of the senior management team to fully anticipate and deal with the impact of training on 387’s and IET^▸ (Intercity Express Train)’s on traincrew availability to run the service.  This issue didn’t suddenly appear – it could be seen coming many months if not years in advance.

I think the phrase “getting drivers to work rest days for training” may be indicative of a lack of respect for drivers and may reflect the culture at GWR.  Other “old hands” have commented on the culture at Swindon: watching your back, stress, aversion to risk, looking forward to retirement etc.

As I’ve said before, in a service organisation you need to take your staff with you.  Valuing and respecting them is just a start.  In my long railway career the best example of this was at Thames and Chiltern under Dick Fearn.  How often did T&C cancel a train for lack of traincrew?  Hardly ever.  If it looked like a turn was going to be uncovered a quick phone call between a local manager and a driver (who knew each other) would fix it.  More effective than impersonal texts.

Now I’ll just wait for a response from someone saying that working for GWR and at Swindon in particular is a really pleasant and fulfilling experience…..

[old original]

Now I’ll just wait for a response from someone saying that working for GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) and at Swindon in particular is a really pleasant and fulfilling experience…..

Not going to happen, I fear.

[ChrisB]

You can't train staff months in advance before working. They'd need at least refresher training is nce the stock arrived. Which could be problematical if training hadn't completed at the point the trains were made available. Also you can't start training until you have stock to train them on!

Thought you knewcbetter than that GtBE

[devonexpress]

I think the phrase “getting drivers to work rest days for training” may be indicative of a lack of respect for drivers and may reflect the culture at GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway).  Other “old hands” have commented on the culture at Swindon: watching your back, stress, aversion to risk, looking forward to retirement etc.

Being fair, in aviation you are often called work work your rest days or sent abroad for emergencies, as far as the management is concerned your getting paid for it, so whats your problem.  These days like everything you don't get a break and a chance to enjoy your own life, its either work or nothing.

As for Mark Hopwood, I would rather he focused on fixing the holes that GWR and NR^» (Network Rail - home page) have dug, than dealing with passengers who often complain for the sake of complaining.

[ChrisB]

Says someone who hasn't had to experience the awful service, obviously

[grahame]

Yes, but have you actually read it properly.  Focus will be on Cotswold services, and stuff everywhere else.....

Well I guess it’s been written to cater for those with whom it was written to. If it was being written to those in South Wales it would be differently worded. In my view behind the North Cotswold line its South Wales that has suffered the most from cancellations and running short due to train crew issues of late.

I applaud the letter as it admits from the top to a public audience that there are know issues and they are getting attention, all be it no instant solutions.  And I appreciate the trepidations with with writing such a letter in that whatever is said, it's not going to be good enough for some - indeed there will be some who admit to seeing zero merit in it and others who suggest that concentration should be on fixing the issues and not on explaining them and apologising for them.

However, two cheers out of three as far as I'm concerned.   Acknowledegment of the issues and that something should be done is huge.  So is an apology admitting that whilst things go wrong, the current situation has really taken the biscuit.   The cheer that's missing start from a concern that the Cotswold line is to be prioritised in a letter to the CLPG^» (Cotswold Line Promotion Group - about), and a wondering if the same thing is being said to everyone (which cannot be true) or if the eye is indeed going to be less on the ball on other services;   I fear this latter's the case with several station manager roles removed in the Bath / Bristol area, and yet more station management promised on the north cotswolds.

A good step.   A pity the meeting to which it refers is members only.   I wonder if anyone's considered joining for £6 so they can go along?  But reading here, I know we have a number of members who are Cotswold line members, and I would encourage them to file a brief and pertinent report.

A good step.  But not the whole journey.  A journey does, though, start with a single step.

[TaplowGreen]

BNM nails it for me.

It's a small gesture to a very small audience which even then is preceded with an apology for the late response!

This should be addressed to every GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) customer and distributed across all platforms and channels network-wide to maximise coverage - perhaps in the same way as the "Famous Five" campaign? And this should have happened some time ago

If this is the "single step" at the start of the journey then heaven help GWR, and more importantly its customers.

The problem is that this has taken so long to happen and has been executed in such a limited way that the initial response is bound to be cynicism and dissatisfaction - had Hopwood taken the bull by the horns some months ago when these problems were first a widespread issue, and arranged effective comms and frequent updates, it would be received more positively - it shouldn't be beyond someone with an MD's remit to have put this in place.