As the Labour Party leadership election moves towards it's final phase, the future ownership of Britain's railway network has emerged as a key issue. Should the railways eventually come under the complete ownership of the state, this will be the third occasion in which Britain's railways will have switched between either public or private ownership since 1948.
The way I see things is that we don't have a completely privatised railway anymore anyway, courtesy of the Blair Labour government bringing the track and signals back into public ownership, through the creation of Network Rail, following the collapse of Railtrack. Plus, the private train operators don't have permanent control of a section of the rail network, courtesy of the franchise system. Ultimately, we really have a mixed private/public system.
I can drive, but I am not a car owner at present. I do in fact use the train most days, and sometimes travel around the North West of England or into a neighbouring region. Whilst I am no railway buff, I do certainly make more use of the railway than the average Brit, and I certainly don't consider the majority of my train journeys to be problematic at all under the current private/public system.
It is true that I could save a lot of time by having my own transport, albeit at the expense of exercise! But moving the railway back into the public sector would have little impact on me saving time with my journeys. That said, I do see benefits of a fully integrated publicly owned railway eventually, by simply allowing existing private franchises to run their course. For instance, the whole railway would be more accountable to the public as a whole, rather than shareholders.
On the other side of the coin, it is all very well to talk up a future Labour government bringing the railways back into full public ownership, on the basis of the popular support the policy has. Would it be a sustainable policy?
Under Britain's current First Past The Post electoral system, I would argue that it is not necessarily the case. A future Conservative government with a false majority could in theory look to privatise the railways once again in the future, even if we are talking 20 or 30 years in the future.
Electoral systems based on more proportionality do generally produce more sustainable policies, due to the need for more than one party to support and shape a policy in question, and subsequently pass the legislation. Consequently, any future government wishing to simply undo a previous government's policies, could only do this with broad support also.
First Past The Post (FPTP) democracies by contrast produce broad church one party governments who generally have a disproportionate number of parliamentary seats, compared to the number of seats that the average coalition government would hold under a more proportionate system. That is why FPTP produces false majorities!
Should a future Conservative government seriously wish to privatise a nationalised railway once more, a proportional electoral system would simply mean that a privatised national railway will need to be a popular policy with support across society, which would translate into support from at least one other political party.
It does not matter if the next Labour government is led by current front runner Jeremy Corbyn, any of his current leadership rivals, or somebody completely different. I know that most Brits at present would probably opt to go with re-nationalisation. However, public ownership of the railways without electoral reform will purely serve as the latest instalment in game of pass the parcel between the private and public sectors.
The railways are too important for either side of the political spectrum to kick about like a football. They are a symbol of the need for more stable policies, and A CLASSIC REASON WHY BRITAIN NEEDS PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION.
The way I see things is that we don't have a completely privatised railway anymore anyway, courtesy of the Blair Labour government bringing the track and signals back into public ownership, through the creation of Network Rail, following the collapse of Railtrack. Plus, the private train operators don't have permanent control of a section of the rail network, courtesy of the franchise system. Ultimately, we really have a mixed private/public system.
I can drive, but I am not a car owner at present. I do in fact use the train most days, and sometimes travel around the North West of England or into a neighbouring region. Whilst I am no railway buff, I do certainly make more use of the railway than the average Brit, and I certainly don't consider the majority of my train journeys to be problematic at all under the current private/public system.
It is true that I could save a lot of time by having my own transport, albeit at the expense of exercise! But moving the railway back into the public sector would have little impact on me saving time with my journeys. That said, I do see benefits of a fully integrated publicly owned railway eventually, by simply allowing existing private franchises to run their course. For instance, the whole railway would be more accountable to the public as a whole, rather than shareholders.
On the other side of the coin, it is all very well to talk up a future Labour government bringing the railways back into full public ownership, on the basis of the popular support the policy has. Would it be a sustainable policy?
Under Britain's current First Past The Post electoral system, I would argue that it is not necessarily the case. A future Conservative government with a false majority could in theory look to privatise the railways once again in the future, even if we are talking 20 or 30 years in the future.
Electoral systems based on more proportionality do generally produce more sustainable policies, due to the need for more than one party to support and shape a policy in question, and subsequently pass the legislation. Consequently, any future government wishing to simply undo a previous government's policies, could only do this with broad support also.
First Past The Post (FPTP) democracies by contrast produce broad church one party governments who generally have a disproportionate number of parliamentary seats, compared to the number of seats that the average coalition government would hold under a more proportionate system. That is why FPTP produces false majorities!
Should a future Conservative government seriously wish to privatise a nationalised railway once more, a proportional electoral system would simply mean that a privatised national railway will need to be a popular policy with support across society, which would translate into support from at least one other political party.
It does not matter if the next Labour government is led by current front runner Jeremy Corbyn, any of his current leadership rivals, or somebody completely different. I know that most Brits at present would probably opt to go with re-nationalisation. However, public ownership of the railways without electoral reform will purely serve as the latest instalment in game of pass the parcel between the private and public sectors.
The railways are too important for either side of the political spectrum to kick about like a football. They are a symbol of the need for more stable policies, and A CLASSIC REASON WHY BRITAIN NEEDS PROPORTIONAL REPRESENTATION.
No comments:
Post a Comment