Labour's plan to nationalise the railway network is ill-thought out and “deeply ideological”, according to the Shadow Transport Secretary.
Helen Whately told GB News: “We know that the railways need reform and when we were in government, we were planning that ourselves. But I also know that what passengers really care about are mainly two things.
“One is about their fares and railways being affordable and the other is about reliability, trains turning up and turning up on time.
“The problem with the bill we're going to be debating in Parliament today is that it doesn't address either of those things.
“It's not expected to make things better for fares or for reliability. There's a risk it could make things worse, and what it really is is a deeply ideological bill.
“It's basically saying private sector bad, public sector good, and putting the minister in charge of running train operating companies.
“That could make things worse. It could be really expensive for passengers and for taxpayers, and particularly one thing it will do is give more power to the unions, and that's something I'm really concerned about now.
“One of the things is that over time, all of the train companies, most of which at the moment are run privately, will come into the public sector and report essentially to the minister.
“That's adding thousands of railway workers onto the public payroll and we'll expect to see ministers under Labour’s system negotiating directly with unions.
“We already saw ASLEF get a huge pay deal of 15 per cent, or almost 15 per cent, and very soon after Labour came into power.
“One of the things I'm going to be arguing for today is that what there should be is an independent pay review body like we have for teachers, like we have for nurses, like we have for the armed forces, so it's not just a matter of ministers sitting down with unions.
“We know lots of Labour MPs get donations from unions, and actually we need to have a system which is better for taxpayers as well as for the workers.”
WATCH ABOVE.
Find Out More...
Helen Whately told GB News: “We know that the railways need reform and when we were in government, we were planning that ourselves. But I also know that what passengers really care about are mainly two things.
“One is about their fares and railways being affordable and the other is about reliability, trains turning up and turning up on time.
“The problem with the bill we're going to be debating in Parliament today is that it doesn't address either of those things.
“It's not expected to make things better for fares or for reliability. There's a risk it could make things worse, and what it really is is a deeply ideological bill.
“It's basically saying private sector bad, public sector good, and putting the minister in charge of running train operating companies.
“That could make things worse. It could be really expensive for passengers and for taxpayers, and particularly one thing it will do is give more power to the unions, and that's something I'm really concerned about now.
“One of the things is that over time, all of the train companies, most of which at the moment are run privately, will come into the public sector and report essentially to the minister.
“That's adding thousands of railway workers onto the public payroll and we'll expect to see ministers under Labour’s system negotiating directly with unions.
“We already saw ASLEF get a huge pay deal of 15 per cent, or almost 15 per cent, and very soon after Labour came into power.
“One of the things I'm going to be arguing for today is that what there should be is an independent pay review body like we have for teachers, like we have for nurses, like we have for the armed forces, so it's not just a matter of ministers sitting down with unions.
“We know lots of Labour MPs get donations from unions, and actually we need to have a system which is better for taxpayers as well as for the workers.”
WATCH ABOVE.
Find Out More...
