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One thing hasn't changed with privatisation – the Post Office is cheesed off with its rail services. So why don't they run their own trains?
Trunk hauling mail by rail is what my West Coast chums ( USA not Railtrack) call a ‘no brainer'. The Post Office wants to run the same timetable every day. Its trains run at passenger speeds between the main centres of population. Mail and Rail ought to go together like, well, Deltics and the ECML.
But no. At this year's Rail Freight conference Adrian Shooter of Chiltern enlivened a rather worthy afternoon session with some thoughts on the importance of quality of service for freight.
Adrian recalled the day in 1989 when he was called in to see BR Vice Chairman David Kirby who said, Congratulations, you've got the job'. The ‘job' turned out to be Director Parcels and Kirby's parting remark was ‘You'll have to get rid of that bloody silly Post Office contract'.
Shooter knew that said contract, involving 180 trains a day, was worth £54million a year and said nothing. But he did think that getting rid of one of BR's biggest customers was a bit odd.
What had made the Post Office business unattractive was the collapse of Fleet Street. When papers were printed in London and distributed by rail, the destinations and timing requirements were much the same as mail. So one train could serve two customers.
But when new technology moved printing of the dailies out to the regions, BR was left with the same resources, but only one customer and one source of revenue. Hence, presumably, David Kirby's remark.
Shooter's first move was to ask to see the then Managing Director of the Post Office Bill Cockburn to ask what the customer really wanted. He was rebuffed. ‘No, BR's cooked its goose, you've had it'.
So with Charles Belcher (now at Silverlink) appointed as Parcel's new National Business Manager for the Post Office, a drive started to get the ‘time plus 10 minute' arrivals for the ‘postals' up from 84% to above 90%. Don't ask me how this was explained as a strategy for getting rid of the business.
A year after the first approach, Shooter went back to Cockburn and was granted an interview. ‘You really do want our business, don't you' Cockburn said. ‘Yes' replied Shooter, ‘can I talk to your people about our ideas on hub and spoke operation'? Cockburn agreed.
‘He still didn't let me sit down' Shooter remembers. But the Willesden Depot and the fleet of postal electric multiple units are some of the fruits of that new relationship. A relationship which was sealed when Bill Cockburn was invited to name a loco at the unveiling of the Res corporate identity and found his name on the plate.
Then came privatisation. Res became part of English Welsh & Scottish Railway which operated trains on behalf of the Post Office. And earlier this year it became clear that the Post Office was worried about its rail service.
Apart from the usual reliability and punctuality complaints, the ban on unmodified Mk 1 passenger stock after 31 December 2002 was causing concern, since the fleet of Travelling Post Office vehicles is all Mk 1.
Strictly the ban applies only to Mk 1 stock carrying fare paying passengers. This exempts the TPOs in theory, since they which carry Post Office employees, but remember that a postman was killed in the accident at Stafford involving a TPO. One could see the unions taking up the crashworthiness issue on behalf of members working in the trains.
At the same time, the Post Office is ambivalent about Rail as ever. Road congestion ought to mean increased use of rail. But the current quality of service gives the road hawks a powerful argument against.
A strategic review of mail transport is currently under way. Paul Bateson, the Post Office's Director of Logistics says the review ‘will be looking at rail with the Post Office's strategic interests at heart and what comes out will determine the nature of the future contracts we go out to tender for'.
Ambitions include running more trains from southern England to Birmingham and then northward via the West Coast Main Line. But the Post Office also wants shorter transit times to combat any competition following deregulation of postal deliveries.
How much shorter? Well, running at line speed over the 125mile/h passenger routes could bring forward arrival times at key distribution centres, like Bristol , on the Post Office network by up to 30min.
So, not only are the Mk 1 TPOs a potential industrial relations liability, their 100mile/h maximum speed could also be a commercial handicap. And the solution is blindingly obvious.
No, not converted Mk3 stock hauled by Class 67s. What the Post Office needs is a fleet of 125mile/h Diesel Multiple Units. And, they have a choice of two designs, already in production.
This seems to be the way the Post Office is thinking. According to Bateson ‘Premium freight has to be treated like passengers; we have to have to have access to the high speed paths in the future'. And access to high speed paths means high speed traction.
So if the Rail faction in the Post Office get the upper hand, replacement of the TPO fleet with 125mile/h go anywhere DMUs could be combined with a new dedicated terminal at Birmingham . This would have the added attraction of getting postal traffic out of the busy New Street station
Right that's sorted, then. Not quite. EWS, not the Post Office, operates the postals. And according to one informed postie ‘We are frustrated at not having a seat at the table at negotiations with Railtrack and having to work through EWS'.
Before the post Office can commit itself to greater use of rail, we need to be assured that we will get speedier transport of mail and greater flexibility' John Roberts, Chief Executive post Office |
For example, at the end of June, ‘out of the blue' the Post Office received a letter from Railtrack saying that because of the Euston remodelling work, there would be no rail connection between the Post Office Rail Terminal at Willesden and the WCML from 23 December to 2 January.
What really got up the nose of Chief Executive John Roberts was the lack of any consultation. Had EWS been consulted? Well, if so, they hadn't passed on the message.
‘We were dismayed' said Roberts afterwards, ‘because as a major customer there was not even any consultation with us about a change that could affect major amounts of our customers' mail at this key time of the year'. After a letter went back , typed on cardboard, according to one Post Office wit, Roberts was mollified. ‘Railtrack have now met us and agreed to service Royal Mail with an operable rail head ensuring that the majority of our mail trains will now run'.
But once again two natural partners are at loggerheads. And, in truth the Post Office is partly to blame for not understanding the structure of the privatised railway. What do you mean ‘why should a customer have to understand anything', the Post Office is a player and should have known better.
Anyway, privatisation makes the resolution so simple. So here is another example of high level consultancy for only £2.95.
First, the Post Office becomes a Train Operator. The hardest part is getting a railway safety case, but as an operator the business could be eligible for track access grants.
In parallel it starts talks with EWS on amicable early termination of the Postal contract. Railtrack is waiting for the phone call to quote direct access charges.
No action is necessary on new trains. As soon as the ROSCOs and financiers get wind of the move they will have their leasing teams asking for prices and calculating lease rates for stripped out postal Coradiae and Voyagers.
Then as old Wystan put it
‘Here's the Coradia crossing the border
Bringing the cheque and the postal order
Cruising up Beattock at 125
(That's enough pastiche for this month, ed)
BidwatchHi there, long time no see! Roddy Orr-Watt back briefly for an up date on what isn't happening on franchise replacement. A decision on Chiltern is said to be ‘imminent' but the really sexy decisions keep on being put back. A choice between the InterCity East Coast ‘best and finals' from Sea Containers and Virgin/Stagecoach was due in July. Now it has been put back to the ‘Autumn'. According to Mikey Grant ‘The level of the proposals received so far require more development and improvement before I will be in a position to make my final decision. More work has to be done'. My mole in the SSRA says they're really waiting for Roger's verdict on the feasibility of the 4000hp diesels in both bids. Still, the Autumn gives Shadow Rail until the end of November, unless they're working to astrological time, in which case the deadline is the winter solstice. Still, it should all be over by Christmas as my Grandad used to say. Network South Central looks as if it's slipping back too. The bidding teams were expecting to hear who had won by the end of August – now they've been called in for more clarification. Talking of clarification, I've got involved in helping Shadow Rail work out how the track records of bidders are going to be factored into bid evaluations. This all started when Lord Gus McDonald, the Transport Minister confided in his old mate Tony Miles, who's the wiz behind my audio visual presentation company, ‘we will listen to the views of the passenger', when it comes to choosing replacement franchise operators. But it's got to be a bit more scientific than walking up and down Brighton station asking commuters ‘Which do you prefer, Connex or Go Ahead'? Unless there's going to be an outbreak of judicial reviews from unsuccessful bidders, track records have to be calibrated in cash terms. And the result subtracted from the net present value of the franchise bid. Which is where I come in. It was Rail Index, my spread betting business that got me into writing Bidwatch. Well, calculating spreads on franchise bids means that we have a lot of expertise on quantifying the effects of what my propeller heads call ‘non financial factors factors'. So when Shadow Rail advertised for consultants to help with franchise replacement, Bonkers Rail Advice (Slogan: Support where it's needed) was in like a shot and we've been doing some informal work on Chiltern in advance of a formal contract. This is how it stacks up.Incumbent M40 trains has a 91% customer satisfaction rating compared with Go Ahead's 82% at Thames . So what's nine track record points worth? Say half a mill each, then that's £4.5million to big Ade Shooter. Then Chiltern has ordered 27 DMU vehicles outside its franchise commitment to Thames Trains' nil. So that has to go in the matrix. Another half mill each sounds about right. As for safety… Still, must dash, Tom and Gerald want to see if spread betting techniques can be applied to give them a better steer on infrastructure upgrade costs.
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