Trains in the UK vs other countries

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Mobster
Soldato
Joined
9 Apr 2012
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13,166
One of the main objections to rail nationalisation in this country is that in the days of British Rail, there were lots of strikes and this would be repeated if the trains were to be run under public ownership once again.

How do other countries manage then? I don't hear of any strikes in Germany or France, or Spain, or Italy. I'm sure they must happen but clearly these countries have never considered privatising their railways like we have done and I am sure the strikes must have been one motivating factor for the Government doing it (the other being money of course).

Am I mistaken? Would be interested to hear if I've got this right.
 
Got caught up in a national rail strike in Italy 2 weeks ago. They happen. They suck.
But they do have guarantees on certain lines at certain times so, for example, all commuter trains between 0600 and 0900 and the similar evening rush hour will always run regardless.
 
You've never heard of a rail strike in France :eek:?

French railways are miles better than British ones, but strikes happen, and often.
 
So what about ownership of the railways in Europe? Are they mainly owned by the government still? Unlike the UK where we subsidise the franchise owners, often foreign owned, yet still allow them to profit and hike prices every year?
 
The best train I ever went on was in Finland. It had a children's play area in it with books and toys. All was clean and none of it was tied down. I commented to the girl I was dating at the time that it would last less than 5 minutes in the UK. She looked at me with a confused expression and asked "But why would anyone want to destroy it when it belongs to you anyway? It's like destroying your own stuff". Very different psyche in some other countries.
But yes, strikes do happen in other EU countries and it's not all roses. I've been on some pretty poor trains in France and Spain.

I do favour nationalisation of the railways though along with most public services. They should be provided by the government, paid for by the people, with no requirement to make anyone wealthy through the running of them. Yes, I do remember British Rail and it was awful. I don't think it was the privatisation that made them better though.

People who are anti-nationalisation of the railways always like to cite terrible strikes. We have those now with private rail companies so I don't really see how it would make any difference to that.
 
Rilot said:
People who are anti-nationalisation of the railways always like to cite terrible strikes. We have those now with private rail companies so I don't really see how it would make any difference to that.
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If you include Southern, then yes. Southern have a bit of a unique franchise though in that they don't get penalised like other operators.

I've been using GWR (FGW) for the past nearly 3 years on a daily basis and they are fantastic, I can remember two short strikes in that time which didn't affect me and 99% of the times the trains are late is because of signalling or overrunning track work by Network Rail. Who owns Network Rail again?

I lived in Germany from the late 90s until the mid 2000s and I couldn't believe the improvement on the UK railways in my area when I got back. There is no way I would ever have considered commuting from the Thames Valley to London every day 20 years ago.
 
Gigabit said:
One of the main objections to rail nationalisation in this country is that in the days of British Rail, there were lots of strikes and this would be repeated if the trains were to be run under public ownership once again.

How do other countries manage then? I don't hear of any strikes in Germany or France, or Spain, or Italy. I'm sure they must happen but clearly these countries have never considered privatising their railways like we have done and I am sure the strikes must have been one motivating factor for the Government doing it (the other being money of course).

Am I mistaken? Would be interested to hear if I've got this right.
Click to expand...

Italy virtually has a transport strike every other month. I work for an Italian owned company and get internal emails warning employees travelling to Italy on business that there's a transport strike on. It's almost like clockwork
 
Been to Tunisia a few times and the trains were always bang on time.

OK the doors might of fell off if you lent on them !

If a (poor) country like Tunisia can do it, it is possible.
 
Rilot said:
I commented to the girl I was dating at the time that it would last less than 5 minutes in the UK.
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The best bit is the same people who are trashing it are usually the first ones to complain when those facilities are removed or suspended :s
 
I think the best system would be similar to the system we have now, but some franchises are in public hands. If a state operated franchise isn't working (to many strikes etc), then sell it off at the next renewal. If a private franchise isn't working, take it into state ownership.

What must be avoided is the state making huge investments in failing franchises, only to see them move into private hands at a later date. If they are "working", they should continue to remain in public hands.

The main issue is, the conservatives are ideologically opposed to state ownership, in the way Labour were ideologically opposed to private ownership of key industries before they scraped clause 4.

Neither party can really be trusted to do what's best for everyone in the long term.

Like everything, rail, health, education, brexit, social care, tax, regulation etc etc we are missing a common sense party.
 
Em3bbs said:
I lived in Germany from the late 90s until the mid 2000s and I couldn't believe the improvement on the UK railways in my area when I got back. There is no way I would ever have considered commuting from the Thames Valley to London every day 20 years ago.
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We've invested a lot of public cash in the railways in the past 20 years though. The bonkers situation we have in the UK is that the government spends 4-6 times more now (in real terms) than they did when the railways were in public hands in the 80s.

Our railways were chronically underfunded in the 80s and it's taking a lot of money to modernise our network.
 
Rilot said:
The best train I ever went on was in Finland. It had a children's play area in it with books and toys. All was clean and none of it was tied down.
Click to expand...
We went on a train journey in Finland when my first daughter was about 14 months. It was indeed amazing. Ten years on, this summer, we're going to be going on train journeys in Denmark. I'm looking forward to seeing how their trains check out.

Way back in the day I went on the tgv in France with my then girlfriend. We had our own little compartment for raunching it up, but that's another story.
 
Public transport on the continent runs better (mostly) and is in far better condition* (very little/if any graffiti, rubbish etc)

*that I've used
 
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