Why not sell BR to the staff?
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IT HAS BEEN suggested that employees might buy the American Conrail railway — an option notably absent from those put up by the Serpell report on the future of British Rail.
Unlike the employees who own the National Freight Consortium, many British railwaymen obviously believe that the public owes them a living. An extra £25 a week to drive an electric train without an unnecessary guard is dismissed as derisory, so new rolling stock for which you and I have forked out millions of pounds stands axle-deep in weeds in sidings. Train drivers ought to try their hands with big 16-speed artics on crowded roads, finding their way often to obscure addresses at which, after inching through needle-eye gates, they have at least to help to unload anything up to 20 tons. Then they would know the meaning of work, skill, initiative and responsibility. They could even be proud of themselves.