LIBERAL Democrat and Labour councillors have clashed over full-scale nationalisation of the railways.
There was total agreement on the appalling response from Northern Rail to the current fiasco rail users in Warrington are suffering and the need to hold the Minister and the company to account.
But the Lib Dems did not see nationalisation as an answer to the problem.
Cllr Ryan Bate said, “The disruption caused by the timetable changes comes with great economic and social cost causing untold anger and anguish as people struggle to get to work, to school, to medical appointments and go about their daily lives.
“If Labour would remove their call for public ownership from their motion we would support it so there would be cross-party consensus. This would give greater weight to our MPs as they seek the best solution for our borough.
“How and when they want to achieve full-on nationalisation is unclear and there are many options for a middle way between nationalisation and privatisation such as some form of public / private partnership or what is called stakeholder capitalism. I am sorry that they have rejected the opportunity for consensus.”
Cllr Ian Marks (pictured) added, “We think Labour’s faith in the benefits of nationalisation is misguided. It would cost a huge amount of money and remember it was nationalised British Rail that wielded the Beeching axe and under-invested in the 60s and 70s.
“We would reform the franchising system by banning companies that substantially breach the terms of their contract from bidding for further franchises for a period of time. Liberal Democrats would give local authorities, city regions and ‘Transport for the North’ a greater role in operating franchises in their areas.”
Councillors clash over rail nationalisation
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It was not British Rail that wielded the Beeching Axe as Cllr Marks claims, but Earnest Marples (of Marples Ridgeway and motorway building fame) the then Minister of Transport who let loose a chemist (Dr Beeching from ICI) on our national rail network, in the mistaken belief his training as a chemist would solve the problems which beset our railways, by massively pruning lines across the country that we could beneficially make use of now. Moreover, Dr Beeching much later said he “would do the same the same again”, so confirm the shortsightedness of his original actions.
On checking the text of the Beeching report itself there is a clear statement that the proposals for line closes were made by the regions of the railways themselves and not made up by the evil Dr.