ScotRail

[WouldBeGood]

What do people think/hope Scot Gov should be doing about the train shambles?

it will have a significant detrimental effect on my family life ensuring my husband misses eating with the children and ensuring I have to take a trialling child to evening activities.

but I don’t see what they can do Immediately new drivers need to be trained up but that will take time.

Another total disaster by Sturgeon and the SNP government. Right up there with Calmac and Prestwick Airport.

Unfortunately this time it will affect many more people.

Its going to be really challenging for commuters and what a time to bring it in as all the tourists arrive.

Anyone living outside the cities is effectively grounded in the evenings.

Offer better overtime pay starting from tomorrow. This will presumably be costly while there’s a shortage of drivers but if the SG can get enough drivers trained and past their supervised period they shouldn’t need to rely on drivers routinely doing overtime.

As I understand it, part of why they/we are so screwed is that Scotrail is now nationalised, and thus in the same bracket as other public services when it comes to pay deals. They can't give train drivers a more generous overtime package without also giving it to council workers, teachers etc., and very quickly this becomes farcically unaffordable. What they should have done is train more drivers long before it got to crisis point (this has been known about for a long while), but since a predictable lack of foresight has occurred, maybe there's some way to fast track the training of new drivers? If it really will be several months to get even the first batch through that takes us into festival season and absolute chaos. In the mean time the hospitality industry who are already suffering after extended (and unnecessary) COVID restrictions will be absolutely hammered if people effectively can't go out. If we're not careful we won't have that many restaurants and clubs left.

Totally agree@Y0uCann0tBeSer10us

This driver shortage has been known about for years and is another thing that's being blamed on covid.
IIRC it was only in 1st lockdown in 2020 that ALL driver training ceased. After that essential workers (which public transport came under)
were allowed to take lessons/training and sit tests.
So how many drivers have they trained since July 2020?

Ah, @Y0uCann0tBeSer10us that makes sense on the public sector thing.

i posted this because I wanted a bit more insight/understanding, rather than just being horrified by no trains! So thanks.

Has there been any indication from the SG about what it plans to do? Other than the restricted timetable.

I agree with @Dottychicken

Yes, @Dottychicken and @readsalotgirl63 That does make sense, but might not be possible? I’m not sure how public sector overtime payments work.

@WouldBeGood I think what @Y0uCann0tBeSer10us says is going to be the challenge. SG will presumably be cautious about setting a precedent by raising train drivers pay but I'm not sure how else this is resolved. I'd have thought they could offer a bonus payment for a temporary period until more drivers are trained ?

Apparently it takes 1-2 YEARS to train a train driver to the point where they can operate without supervision. It is a well paid job. Newly qualified drivers earn £38k, and this link says the average driver is on £50k.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-61553947

There would be no shortage of people wanting to take up this sort of employment. But seeing as they are not recruiting, and because of all the reasons @Y0uCann0tBeSer10us lays out about it being a public service, it's a Mexican stand off with the unions.

DH works in Glasgow and was supposed to be going out with colleagues tonight for a curry after work - cancelled because one of the colleagues lives in Girvan and the last train is 17.14.

I don’t understand why they’re not recruiting?

Could they put on buses?

And that must be happening all the time @Stroopwaffels / it’s really rubbish for people and businesses.

Well they are recruiting in that there is a way to apply through the website just as they always are. But there is no special push to recruit new people, if you see what i mean.

Ah. I had read that there was a way to register interest but no actual ongoing recruitment.

I used to get the train to and from work pre pandemic and Abellio were shocking. I'm still mainly WFH - I'm lucky that I can do so but every day I get emails saying the morning train is delayed or cancelled and same for the train home. I'm not going to use the train if I'm not certain I can get home on it.

The green/ govt agenda of reducing car use is at complete odds with what they are actually doing to make public transport attractive let alone a viable alternative

yes, it’s weird. I’d happily use public transport and fully support a green agenda.

I assumed the SG had a plan when they took it over?

A plan, WouldBeGood? Bwahahaha! The SNP? Be serious…

I was just thinking this too.
The driver shortage/overtime issue has been known about for ages but I haven't seen any big advertising campaigns over last few years to recruit new staff🤷🏼‍♀️

To be honest (and I'm no SNP fan) I think Abellio ran the service into the ground and didn't invest in staff numbers and training. Why would they, they are a commercial operation that didn't make any money during Covid then were told they were having the franchise removed.

Anyone with half a brain could have predicted that however, and anyone with half a brain could have done a better job of negotiating the handover and the initial discussions with the unions, who are clearly not interested in becoming the poster boys for re-nationalising services.

Yours sincerely
Also staying in tonight because I can't get home.

And they are GOOD jobs! Well paid jobs! And all you need in terms of academic qualifications is Nat 5s. It's more about situational judgement and awareness than it is about academic qualifications. A 21 year old who has been made redundant or working in hospitality earning minimum wage would be very attracted to that sort of work.

To be honest (and I'm no SNP fan) I think Abellio ran the service into the ground and didn't invest in staff numbers and training.

This is a big issue these days. Companies don't want to invest in training staff, they want someone else to do that. Even entry level jobs seem to ask for experience these days🤷🏼‍♀️
It was the same with HGV driver shortage following brexit. Haulage companies were warned for a couple of years that there would be a problem when they couldn't recruit drivers from Europe but did they start investing in recruiting and training local drivers? No they didn't want the hassle and expense!

There's no train in the mornings anymore from our area that would allow parents to drop their kids at childcare and make it into the city centre for a 9am start.

Last train back 19.45. Taxis back from town before this were asking for £50 up front in cash.

I feel sorry for the young people who have had two years of not being able to go out because of covid and now this. Pubs, clubs and restaurants will suffer.

It's (yet another) utter bloody shambles from the SNP.

There's no way these will be short term temporary timetable changes. This will be fairly long term as I can't see a way they can resolve this quickly.

Agree. Its going to be a bugger going to work and getting home for a while. I wonder if firstbus are increasing services?

It was a shambles before, but it’s now worse, abs for the SG to sort out.

they kept on the head of Abelio for some reason, on a salary of £320,000.

i was hoping there was a plan

@ssd yes, I was wondering about more buses?