One of the things I observed during my tenure both at Network Rail and subsequently working as a contractor in the industry was Network Rail’s abject inability to secure competent management. One of my colleagues once joked that asking a Network Rail manager to make a decision was akin to watching a rabbit caught in the headlights of a car. They really don’t like making decisions for fear of it backfiring on them. The result being a kind of corporate paralysis and overweening safety rules that are divorced from reality. An example of this being the idiotic safe system of work package that resembled a novel when doing something as simple as a track walk with a group of trainees. I was even required to do a task brief for going for a walk, for God’s sake. Compare and contrast with Northern Ireland Railways who have a simple, common sense approach and manage not to kill their track workers as a result even though they do a significant amount of basic maintenance work under open lines with trains running normally.
This story pretty much sums up the lack of talent at Network Rail.
A Network Rail manager sparked fury after suggesting workers voting on strikes over pay ‘should have probably worked harder at school’.
Nicky Hughes, head of communications for Network Rail’s Wales and western region, made the comment while defending the high pay of senior leaders.
She may have a point of course. However, as a specialist in communications, she could – and should – have made a better job of it. Cue the inevitable apology, making her look weak and foolish. It would appear that in the fifteen years or so since I left this dreadful organisation, nothing much has changed.
Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association general secretary Manuel Cortes claimed the ‘foolish post’ shows ‘how desperately out of touch the company’s fat cats really are’.
He also has a point, of course. Not that calling a strike is going to change anything. As I have discovered, they never really improve matters for anyone involved. But on this point, I agree. The woman looks a fool. So, well qualified for a senior role in Network Rail.
A Network Rail spokesman said her comments were ‘misconstrued’ and she was ‘referring to her own experiences’.
Her raison d’être is communications. If she can’t communicate effectively without being ‘misconstrued,’ why is she in her job?
Because the raison d’être of some people is to ‘misconstrue’ anything that ‘The Man’ may say. Professional offence taking is a career choice. It shouldn’t be. But it is.
And someone whose job is communication should be one step ahead of them.
It was always thus.
My father was a wheeltapper back in the day. Honestly. At an end of the line ferry port. British Railways owned and ran the ferries too.
Maybe once a year the “Management” hitched on a first class coach and arrived to see how things were going.
It was a day out for the boys. A piss up.
That was it.
They saw nothing and as a result changed nothing.
The ferries were the money maker. Always booked solid.
Did they think of improving the ferry service? Why would they?
They were railway managers. In a sacred industry. Like NHS today.
In the end they gave up on the ferries and two private companies have since been doing very nicely but with competition doing what it should do. Business is booming.
This yearly jamboree let the workers see what a load of tossers they were working for and as a result did not bust a gut for the sake of the company.
Yup, nothing changes.
Northern Ireland peple in general have a simple, common sense approach to most things and flout rules if best way to achieve objective
Common sense:
– “Why not lease a few roads for Car & MC Races for a long weekend?”
– “Bloddy hell, not another bomb. Right, get it cleaned up and everything open again immediatley”
Stormont hotel car bomb: hotel didn’t close, simply closed off damaged areas. I was in it in closed areas morning after the ~01:00 bomb. Little interior damage as hotel designed to be bomb resilient. Photos I took from car park minutes after bomb were publishd in Belfast Newsletter
@LR
Was Network Rail better run when it was Railtrack?
Short answer, probably no. Longer answer is a little more nuanced. The horizontal split basically set Railtrack up to fail. A lot of the safety team ended up with the train operators or the infrastructure companies, leaving gaps in Railtrack’s abilities to effectively manage not only its own safety systems but the oversee those of its contractors and the TOCs.
This was the underlying problem that lead to the incidents at Ladbroke Grove, Potters Bar and Hatfield. There was more to it than that, but that was a big part of it.
On the upside, Railtrack had a fairly common sense approach to management, but the failures leading to these events and the fallout led to an internal panic. In the early days it was a mess, which, to be fair to the incoming NWR team, they did try to sort out. The track safety systems were outsourced and became ever more fear based – hence my comment about huge safety packs that are unmanageable for the ordinary worker. They need something simple and effective. NIR manage a whole system on one sheet of A4 – one of the most effective I’ve seen and used. Also, Network Rail came in with a heavy handed approach that brooked no dissent, so they sacked around 300 middle managers. I was one and I was pleased to go as the atmosphere was becoming increasingly toxic. NWR wants yes men and I’m not one of those and it was the awkward squad that got paid off that November after NWR took over. Iain Coucher was a nasty piece of work and used devious means to line his own pockets at the company’s expense, but looked down on the real railway workers with barely concealed contempt. Horrible, horrible man who created that toxic environment. Also, there is this hero worship of the university graduate, so time served signallers are being managed by wet behind the ears children who have little to no idea of the systems they are dealing with. Under Railtrack, mostly front line management was recruited through the ranks, so could do the job themselves and earned a degree of respect because of it. My signallers were well aware that I could work the panel as well as they could.
On balance, yes, in some respects, Railtrack was better, but my first comment of no really applies when you look at the failures that could and should have been avoided. Both as bad as each other in their own ways.
The mention of ferries takes me back to when I used to have to cross the Humber every day on the Farringford ferry. It was quite pleasant and was actually part of my working day. That was in 1980, the Humber bridge opened in 1980 and the farringford was retired.
Don’t worry, Boris’ll fix it all when he sweeps Notwork Rail away into the dustbin of history and replaces it with Great British Railways. Just like Tony Blair sorted out Railtrack, and John Major solved the BR problem. Right?
The father of a friend of mine worked for all three (and the ScotRail franchise once the Edinburgh Gasworks started sticking its oar in). In the same office.