On day of fare rise RMT▸ slams the privateers ‘laughing all the way to the bank’ as union reveals full extent of shareholders’ bonanza at passenger expense
As fares rise on our railways yet again today, rail union RMT has revealed that private companies have siphoned off £4.4 billion in dividends to shareholders in the last ten years.
The union analysed the company accounts of every train operating company that had held a franchise since 2010 together with those of the three rolling stock companies (Roscos).
The figures, published in ‘Counting the Costs of Privatisation’, revealed that the Train Operating Companies (TOCs▸ ) have paid out a total £2.05 billion in dividends to their shareholders since 2010, while the Roscos, who make their money from leasing trains to the TOCs paid out £2.39 billion to their shareholders, often based in low tax jurisdictions like Luxemburg.
Every year, on average, these companies channel £483 million out of the industry to their shareholders, a sum that equates to 5% of passenger fare revenue in 2017/18. That means that over the next five years of Tory government, we can expect that the network will see a further £2.4 billion disappear into shareholders’ pockets.
Interesting read ... extrapolating from those figures, I made that an average train fare of £5, with 12p going to the TOC's shareholders and 14p to the RoSCo's. You could argue that this is money that should be re-invested, or you could argue that this is like the commission on a sale, or a payment to consultants. The final paragraph assumes a straight line / stable setup. Well - it seems far from that, and based purely on the profit element of the last ten years, can we really predict the next five or is it a mere guess?
There's no doubt that systems set up in one era need to be revised and updated in another, and that there are significant elements of the rail operation, finance and development model that have their negatives at present.
The passenger wants a good, stable, affordable, operating railway and that seems hardly what we get.
The passenger wants a service that's going to be planned for the future with local (operational) investment below the political radar that's looking to the future beyond the current franchise period (to 31.3.20 hereabouts). And
the passenger wants something that's not operated as a political lever or football; that happens too much at the moment and I fear that a direct operated railway would be subject to a base environment riding on the rocky road of political expediency and short term voter satisfaction.
I read humorous posts here such as
http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=22661.msg279192#msg279192 and
http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/coffeeshop/index.php?topic=22688.msg279488#msg279488 which suggest both a nervousness and a "what-if" scenario in which
many a true word is written in jest. We are headed for a busy 2020, I suspect. Come Monday, we'll welcome back to work all those people and organisations who are at a level above the operational and in places we'll see some very interesting reports / decisions / announcements / actions. I hope that "interesting" means good for all stakeholders - including passengers, potential passengers, economy, and (last and far from least) climate.
