Author: johnredwood

If on a whim I decided to go to Leeds on a weekday morning it would cost me £96.80 standard class to catch the off peak 11.05 am. If I could delay my journey for a month I could buy a ticket on the same train for just £22.95. If I went on the 11.35 in a month’s time it would cost me just £14.60.

If I wanted to go to Manchester it would cost me £80.60 standard class. If I wanted to go after 3.20pm it would cost me £164.50. If I book in advance to go to Manchester off peak in November it would cost me just £20.

Rail fares are bizarre. Half of them are regulated, mainly to try to prevent the rail industry overcharging for scarce commuter seats into London at the peaks. Regulation has not stopped the imposition of high fares on popular commuter services. The railway gives people huge discounts for buying tickets well in advance, charges the traveller buying a ticket on the day high prices, and imposes a simple cliff edge on fares with big increase in fares at around 3pm and a big drop around 7pm, with a similar peak in the morning.

This system leaves commuters feeling they pay more than their fair share of a heavily subsidised industry. It leads to heavily overcrowded trains on popular routes on the first train after the ending of the peak fare, and still leaves the main commuter lines with insufficient capacity. It clearly fails to maximise revenues or sell the many empty seats I see on many of the trains I use outside the London and Reading area commuter services.

It is curious that the very low advance fares are not more successful in selling off peak seats on long distance trains. Maybe they are insufficiently known. Maybe there is simply too much capacity on these routes. It is also curious that many pay the high single and return fares charged if you buy on the day of travel, given the high premium charged for late purchase.

What seems likely is a revised pattern of fares and service provision could improve seat sales, reduce costs, and give commuters a fairer deal. Can the rail industry rise to that challenge?

The complex system which fails to deliver enough seats on busy routes at popular times and provides many unsold empty seats elsewhere is a reminder of how price regulation can both be well intended and unsuccessful. We need more competition in the railway, to innovate on services and bring in more popular fares and services.

Leaving will be better for business.

Business now agrees we were right to quit the Exchange Rate Mechanism, which damaged jobs and closed factories.

Business now agrees we were right to say No to the Euro, which has helped to create mass unemployment and property crashes in several countries of the EU.

Out of the EU the UK can negotiate her own free trade agreements with China, the USA and India, after 43 years in an EU which has stopped us doing that and has not done it for us.

Out of the EU the UK can decide what regulations and taxes to impose on all our domestic business and all our exports to non EU countries, which represents around 85% of our total income and output.

The UK will continue to trade with the EU, and they will not wish or be able to impose new tariff barriers on us and certainly will not want us imposing barriers on them.

The UK will avoid new taxes like the Financial Transactions Tax, and unfriendly changes to Corporation Tax and VAT which the EU currently carries out.

Some have wrongly argued here that the government has failed to set out what it wishes to achieve from the current renegotiation with the EU. This is not the case, so I will remind people of what the government has said about its plans.

My view is I want “the fundamental change” in the UK’s relationship with the EU that the PM talked about. I want to trade and be friends with them, but to be outside the centralising treaties which force laws and policies on us that we would not choose for ourselves.

More recently the government has identified four big areas for change. They say they are negotiating over each of these areas.

Competitiveness and Regulation – the government wants an EU based on the primacy of more jobs and prosperity, that regulates and interferes less

Sovereignty and competences – the government wants powers back and more ability to stop mandatory policies from the EU through the actions of national Parliaments

A new and clearer relationship with the Eurozone – so the Uk does not have to accept Eurozone requirements on banking, finance etc

More UK control over migration and access to welfare – removing the “pull” factors that are swelling migrant numbers into the UK.

The current debate is over whether the government is asking for enough to satisfy the many voters in the middle of this argument who have not made up their minds on whether to leave the EU or not, and whether the EU will give the UK anything meaningful under these various headings to enable the government to recommend the deal. The government recognises that Treaty change will be needed, but may settle for a promissory note on treaty change which then raises the issue of the powers of the ECJ, what happens in the interim, and the ability of the rest of the EU to deliver given the complexities of securing the consent of all 28 to treaty changes.

Many will conclude leaving is an easier way of resolving the lack of power and democratic control the UK currently suffers from under the present treaties. If it looks as if the UK will vote to leave there will be more chance of securing that fundamental change Mr Cameron has talked about.

Out of the EU the UK will regain her own seat on the World Trade Organisation, and be able to press for world agreements that we want.

The UK will gain a seat or have more influence on world standards bodies which in turn inform EU standards.

The UK will have her own seat and policy at World Summits like the World Climate summits.

The UK will be better treated by France and Germany who will need our support on various issues in the future and will not be able to outvote us in the EU to stifle our opinion.

The UK is the world’s fifth largest economy and one of the world’s most important military powers after the USA, China and Russia. It is high time we were fully represented in our own name in all important world fora.

I would be interested to receive comments on Mr Corbyn’s “new style” of handling PMQs.

Last week I met the Chairman and Chief Executive of the Office of Road and Rail. This body spends £32 million a year of our money on acting as economic and safety regulator of the railways, and acting as a new regulator of the Highways Agency, the government body that runs England’s roads.

I asked them why they had taken no action over Network Rail’s decision to take out foreign currency borrowings which I have warned against before. I asked why they had apparently taken no action over Network Rail’s derivative trading and hedging, nor intervened to stop losses or to complain about them. They reminded me that Network Rail’s finances are now under the control of the Treasury and they will not be making any more foreign currency loans, as if I was unaware of that change. They had no answer on the broader questions, and were taking no action over derivative losses.

They have been agonising over £2m of fines to Network Rail for poor performance. They wish to express their displeasure, but they do not wish to take too much money off a company owned by taxpayers and funded by taxpayers. They clearly have no sense of significant numbers. Network Rail happily lost more than £2m a day every day last year on financial derivatives , so I guess a single £2m fine is neither here nor there to them.

They were also asked about their attitude towards the prolonged closure of the M20 this summer in Operation Stack. They were asked about other options to allow this crucial highway to continue in use. Again they had no helpful answers, and showed no sign of wishing to change things for the better by using their powers.

I came away seeing little value in much of the £32 million spent each year on this body, as it is quite incapable of keeping a major motorway open, and uninterested in stopping major financial losses at Network Rail despite being their economic regulator. I think they said they had to add road regulation to their rail remit to meet EU requirements.Maybe their safety role for rail is better done than the financial regulation.