Bring Back British Rail

Whether we have a nationalised rail service or what we have now, the important thing is efficiency. I think that is more likely with a nationalised service because the whole competition/shareholders needs/profit motive etc would be eliminated. And this chaotic mish mash that we have now would be streamlined.

I once spent many hours in a broken down train in the Severn Tunnel (with the resultant tailback of connections to countless other services) because the rail company would not use the nearest train to pull us out as it belonged to a different company and they would have had to pay - we waited hours until a train from the same company arrived. Crazy!

I once had to travel about 200 miles for a family funeral, and as I wanted to do the 400 mile round trip in a day I contemplated using the train instead of the car. The costs are about 20 years out of date now, but they went like this:

Return fare: £54
Rush hour fare if the funeral had been half an hour earlier: £108
If there had been four people: £432

Petrol for a four seat car: £27

There was some mention of a European state on the radio recently, the Netherlands possibly. They had a flat rate fare for any distance at any time of the day, it was something like 3 euros I think.

I had eight days in York last summer by bus and train, the transport was 43% of the cost, more than the accommodation (39%).

I support re-nationalising the railways. We pay more for train fares than other European countries.

What about a national mail service, they could drive red vans and deliver to remote areas, as well as those that are easier to reach. Watching the various delivery vans arriving on our road, with one parcel for one house - how can that be cheaper in the widest sense, environmentally it can't be - can it?

Trouble is the Green Party opposed to HS2 which I am totally in favour of so have divided loyalties now because I believe that we need a world class rail network. I need to find out more on Monday.

Hang on. People are going to protest to support something?

I think subsidised rail travel would be a good use of government money, if they are serious about protecting the environment.

Where we are, it costs about the same to travel by train as it does to use the car.

I shall find out what is going on in our area as I too would travel by train much more if I could afford the fares , I don't know how people do it..