Retired Railway Officers Society

No. 1558 RETIRED RAILWAY OFFICERS’ SOCIETY www: rros.org.uk [email protected] Minutes of Meeting held in the Chiltern Railways “Cube” room at Moor Street station, Birmingham on Monday 1st August 2011. Present: President: Chris Austin Hon Treasurer: John Sellar Hon Secretary: Richard Malins Lew Adams Mike Harvey David Rayner Keith Alldread Donald Heath Brian Redfern Peter Barlow Alan Hobson Trevor Rimmer Bob Bates Maurice Holmes Mike Robinson Cyril Bleasdale Richard Horne Andrew Salisbury George Bowden George Houldsworth Dave Sargent David Brice Stan Judd Raymond Savill John Burge Clive Kessell Ken Shingleton Neal Clarke Graham King Larry Shore Ian Copland David Mackie Dennis Simmonds John Crone Richard Maund Les Singleton John Cronin John Meara Paul Smith Ray Diver Phil Morton Cedric Spiller David Dixon Bob Moseley Alan Sprod Derek Doling Peter Northfield Theo Steel Doug Eastman Ian Osborne David Stimson Les Giles John Pearson Gerald Summerfield Alan Goldfinch Gordon Pettitt Alan Taylor Hugh Gould Mike Pipes Mike Tyrrell Gareth Hadley Reg Pugh John Vessey Keith Harrison Jim Ward

1. Confirmation of Minutes of the Meeting held on 4th July 2011. These were approved without dissent.

2. News of Members. The President noted with regret the deaths of three members: Jimmy Charters, former Civil Engineer at York aged 75 on 7th July of cancer, with the funeral in Nairn on 15th July. Alan Watson, formerly Finance Manager, Computing, BRB, died on 9th July. Aged 76, he had Parkinsons's disease for some time and the funeral was in Derby on 2nd August. Dennis Rowell, sometime Chief Civil Engineer WR but whose main career was on the Southern, on 24th July aged 81. Funeral in Lindfield United Reformed Church on 5th August. Members stood for a few moments in silent tribute to their memory. Malcolm Southgate has health problems following a diabetic coma and has been in hospital in Maidstone. Non-member John Boyle (formerly Public Affairs manager in Scotland) has been seriously injured in a motorcycle accident in the highlands but is recovering in hospital. The President expressed the pleasure of the meeting in seeing both Theo Steel and Paul Smith present, as recovering cancer patients.

3. Welcome to Members Recently Elected. Lew Adams was attending a meeting for the first time and was accorded a warm welcome as the first Associate member of the Society. Lew said this is the 57th anniversary of him joining the railway, with his seniority date of August 1954. At that time all the locomotives he cleaned were built in Britain.

4. Proposed New Members. The details of the following applicants’ careers were shown in the Agenda and their election was approved: Name: Address and Telephone Number: Sponsors: Nick Owen Willowdown Cottage, Clifton’s Lane Chris Green Reigate, Surrey RH2 9RA 01737 242620 Ken Green Gordon Dudman 56 Alders View Road, East Grinstead Michael Robson Sussex, RH19 2DN 01342 311160 John Wilson

5. Pension & Travel Facilities Matters. On Pensions, John Mayfield could not attend today and John Meara said he had nothing new to report on Travel Facilities.

6. Talk by Anthony Smith, Chief Executive of Passenger Focus on Passenger Priorities. The President introduced Anthony as someone he had known for 10 years, through his sponsorship of the Rail Passengers Councils when working at the SRA. Passenger Focus was born in 2005 as the old order of TUCCs was rationalised and replaced by a unified structure to be un- derpinned by research. Earlier in a career in consumer representation Anthony had worked at “Which?”, where testing what was good or less good in household appliances was quite simple, but with the railway opinions came from all sides and it is more difficult to be objective. The National Passenger Survey (NPS) is now the key to this as it enables Passenger Focus to be more authoritative, the power of research means they cannot be ignored. It costs £1m to do the NPS in spring and au- tumn, with a sample of around 32,000, there is now data going back 8 years and it has become the main measure of passenger satisfaction. There are not meant to be league tables, as all TOCs are dissimilar in some respects, but journalists can add up and none likes to be bottom. There is comparative benchmarking and scores can be used to drive change. The Government will continue NPS with Passenger Focus as its custodian, though TOCs do not want it in their contracts. PF was in the Coalition’s bonfire of Quangos and spent May to October last year on the pyre but was plucked smouldering to survive. Quite why remains un- said, but the price was substantial reform, which meant cuts of 50% in the budget and a loss of a third of the staff. Core research was however protected and the recently added bus remit (England outside London) survives. Although DfT pays, PF is arm’s length and independent with no interference from the sponsor. Their style is to be reasonable with no shouting so they are listened to. The research is all published and needs to be broken down and put out into the open as overall figures can be meaningless. The aim is to effect change through research and this can be done at refranchising. TOCs also worry that representation of minor- ity interests could distort wider decisions. The big issues remain Punctu- ality and Reliability, Fares and Ticketing, or Disruption, and with the growth in IT commuters in particular are more forensic and will take their own decisions. The TOC with the highest level of complaints at present is East Coast, ironic since it is DfT run, and a lot of this is around fares and ticketing. PF does not advise on fare levels as decisions on the level of subsidy are for politicians, but there are concerns about the relationship between walk-up and book-ahead yield managed fares that are train specific at a time when service frequencies have been so much improved. In fact the railway has to be doing a lot right at the mo- ment, with traffic up, safety good, performance better and the whole set- up is well funded. Is it a success and has a corner really been turned or is it just another chapter in a long history? We all know the problem of the new structure is cost, but the Government is locked in through contracts and can’t just turn the tap off as it did with BR. Yet the privatised industry parties are just not going to sort the problems, and it is not clear whether McNulty’s report or franchise remapping will change much. What happens in five years when savings have not been realised remains to be seen, but it is also not in PF’s remit to comment on the industry structure, only impact on passengers (and that word was chosen in pref- erence to customers). Anthony recognises that a lot of decisions are about trade-offs between timings and performance. Existing users may choose punctuality and reliability over speed, but that is what might at- tract new users, although in the current HS2 debate the emphasis should be more on the capacity and performance benefits of a new railway. He admits that he finds the railway industry addictive and full of interest as it involves people. ------No. 1559 Agenda for Meeting To be held at 13.45 in the Union Jack Club, Sandell St. London SE1 on Monday 5th September 2011

1. Minutes of the Meeting held in Birmingham on 1st August 2011.

2. News of Members.

3. Welcome to Members Recently Elected.

4. Proposed New Members. James Crowe will propose and Hugh Gould will second that CLIVE SIDNEY POUGHER be elected an ordinary member of the Society. Clive was born in Beverley on the thirtieth of May 1934 and joined the British Transport Docks Board in 1960 where he became Assistant Docks Engineer at Grimsby & Immingham. He moved in 1968 to BR’s Shipping & International Services Division as Harbour Works Engineer, retiring from Sealink Harbours Ltd in 1990 as Chief Civil Engineer. John Sellar will propose and Trevor Rimmer will second that VINCENT HAROLD SAINS be elected an ordinary member of the Society. Vince was born in London on the nineteenth of July 1951 and joined BR as a Finance and Accountancy Management Trainee on the WR in 1973, with his first post at the Property Board in 1976. In 1980 he moved to BT Hotels / Travellers Fare as Train Catering Accountant, and in 1983 became PA to James Urquhart, Board Member. Accounting roles followed on the LM (DoFAS) and at BR HQ. He was Chief Financial Accountant at Trainload Freight from 1991 and in 1994 returned to the Property Division, for Railtrack and Network Rail, in various finance posts, retiring as Business Planning Manager, Property at NR in 2011.

5. Pension and Travel Facilities Matters.

6. Any Other Business.

7. Talk by Andy Savage on his work at the Railway Heritage Trust.

The Members Luncheon will be on Friday 18th November 2011.

Richard Malins, Honorary Secretary: 7 Orient St, London SE11 4SR Tel/Fax: 020 7582 2395 Mobile:077 7338 9123 Email: [email protected] Vale Press: 01386 858900