Cheaper By Car - Article
Was privatisation the cause? Or the solution?
It seems that many people believe that a major factor in causing the problems we face daily in getting around was the Privatisation of the UK’s rail and bus services.
Although some time ago now, Chris Keene, the Green Party’s campaign co-ordinator commented in Aug 2004:
“In 1979 the outlook for the UK transport scene was positive. On the railways, the Beeching cuts had been stopped, station reopenings had started to gather momentum, and British Rail had developed what was then the world’s premier diesel IC train - the IC125…
…All this was reversed by the new Thatcher government. Britain would see its public transport system deregulated, privatised and fragmented by successive governments that refused to understand the public service that public transport provided.”
These are comments that are still relevant when we look at our situation today. Could it be that previous governments have mistakenly tried to get us into our cars rather than out of them? In fact, in the words of Margaret Thatcher:
“Any man who rides a bus to work after the age of 30 can count himself a failure in life”
That comment now appears ironic whilst I’m sitting in traffic for an hour daily to travel the 17 miles to work because it’s so expensive, dirty and unreliable to take the bus or train. Perhaps the man on the bus to work is less the failure, he can afford it, I can’t.
So if privatisation was a cause, could it now be the solution? What can these private companies and the UK Government do to resolve these issues? Is there enough budget in the chancellors yearly coffer to provide some relief?
Technorati Tags: rail privatisation, bus privatisation, bus, rail, thatcher
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