Concessionary Fares Shambles

The new national concessionary fares scheme starts on Tuesday 1 April – from that date South West residents, who are disabled or aged 60 and over, can travel without charge on any local bus service throughout England free of charge between 0930hrs and 2300hrs on Monday to Friday and at any time on Saturday, Sunday and Public Holidays.

Although local authorities have had over two years to prepare for the introduction of the new scheme, tens of thousands of South West residents (principally in Cornwall, Devon (excluding East Devon) and Torbay) are likely to have to wait up to another twelve days to receive their new passes – in most cases, these disaffected residents can continue to use their former pass, but only to travel on buses within the boundaries of their local council.

First Great Western performance

The publication of the National Rail Trends for the final quarter of 2007 reveals that just 79.7 per cent of trains operated by First Great Western (FGW) ‘arrived on time’ (i.e. less than five or ten minutes late depending on type of service) – this appalling performance compares with the national average of 86.9 per cent for the same quarter and is a further 1.2 per cent lower than the FGW performance for the final quarter of 2006.

ORR Warns Network Rail

The Office of Rail Regulation (ORR) has warned Network Rail there must be an improvement in train punctuality and reliability in the South West of England – ORR is currently monitoring a joint performance improvement plan, developed by First Great Western and Network Rail, to improve performance in the region.

ORR has warned that if the targets for the region are not met in the near future, then the consequences for Network Rail ‘could be severe’ – ORR would then investigate whether Network Rail has breached its licence, and if so, take action, including an unlimited fine.

Regional Transport Board Chair offers differing opinions on First Great Western

19 March 2008

Julian Johnson, a Conservative member of Wiltshire County Council and chair of the South West Regional Assembly transport board, tells the House of Commons Transport select committee that ‘the region would definitely be a better place if it got rid of First Great Western’ – Councillor Johnson also stated that ‘we are most concerned about the franchise and the performance of First Great Western – we would be happier not to have that particular train operating company’.

26 March 2008

Julian Johnson issues a statement to ‘clarify’ his remarks to the Transport select committee – he states that ‘he had meant no general criticism of the company’ and was ‘not advocating the removal of the franchise’.

Ian Liddell-Grainger, the Conservative Member of Parliament for Bridgwater issues a media release stating that ‘this man must be an idiot. Everything you say to a select committee is minuted – you cannot take it back!’

South West Trains strike action postponed

The train drivers union, ASLEF, has suspended the four days of strike action on the South West Trains network proposed to take place from Monday 31 March to Thursday 3 April inclusive – ASLEF suspended the strike action to enable the executive committee of the union to consider three further proposals from South West Trains to reduce the length of driving shifts.

Truronian acquisition

The Office of Fair Trading has cleared the anticipated acquisition of Truronian Limited by FirstGroup plc – the full text of the decision is yet to be published.

The two companies have not yet confirmed the completion of this acquisition, since clearance was obtained from the Office of Fair Trading.

And finally,

A subscriber to the JourneyAlert text messaging service recently introduced by First Great Western received the following message:-

‘0613 Bath Spa to London Paddington will be delayed by about two minutes, due to a delay on a previous journey.’