Off the rails

Once again- failure is being rewarded.

The Westminster government is set to bail out one of our rail franchises part way though its contract again, which means that the company is being released from an obligation to pay the hundreds of millions of pounds that it contracted to pay for the right to run these services.

What’s especially galling is the history of this particular line:
It used to be profitable and publicly run-

But it was only ever publicly run because the last privatised franchise also collapsed mid-way through its run.

Two private companies have now failed to be able to run this line, while the government can and has run it at a profit. So obviously, the next step will be to look for another private company to take it over, because that’s how things are done with either wing of the Tory party in power.

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Amusing update:

The government have now been forced to nationalise the service, as the current consortium of privateers have given up on trying to make a profit out of it. Even so, the word stuck in the throat of the tory minister who had to announce it.

And there was no delay in pointing out that this little kerfuffle has ended up with the government having to implement opposition policy.

Now on to the next one. Hopefully this is the beginning of the end for the disastrous privatisation of an essential transport network.

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Gee, I wonder how many billions were wasted going from nationalized to privatized back to nationalized. And who got rich. And who got taxed out the wazoo.

Answers left as an exercise for the student.

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I thought this topic might be more literal

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