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Union chief slams 'morally bankrupt' Network Rail
19.05.09
A union leader will launch an angry attack against Network Rail today, accusing the company of being "morally bankrupt".
Gerry Doherty, general secretary of the Transport Salaried Staffs Association, will use his keynote speech to the union's annual conference to accuse NR executives of putting private gain ahead of public service.
"The simple reason we have the most expensive and most overcrowded railway system is that we have replaced public service with private gain.
"Travel in France and Spain and you will find affordable, high- speed trains because their railways are run as a public service, the State recognise it is their duty to provide a safe and reliable system for the benefit of the whole population.
"Here in Britain we alone in Europe run a system run for private gain. The system is operated to produce profit for the few at the expense of the many who travel on our trains.
"Billions is poured into the system by our hapless Transport Secretary, Geoff Hoon, and it all goes into the pockets of private shareholders rather then benefiting the people it should - the travelling public and the workforce."
Mr Doherty will tell the conference in Torquay, Devon, that NR is a wholly taxpayer-funded company "masquerading" as a private firm, adding: "It may claim to be a profitable private company but, in my view, it is morally bankrupt."
The union leader will claim there is no effective board of directors at NR, which he said is spending £5 billion a year of public money.
"Instead we have 104 public members who allegedly oversee the full-time directors. But these people, of which I am one, only meet for four days a year and then to sign off Network Rail's accounts.
"These public members are hand-picked by NR and receive no payments apart from travel expenses. They have less power than a parish council and, more to the point, meet less often than a parish council."
Mr Doherty will add: "Network Rail is now costing five times more than British Rail and it still cannot match BR's reliability figures after swallowing over £40 billion of taxpayers' cash in the past seven years and a further £28 billion in the next five."
