Bring Railways in to Public Ownership, Greens will say at tomorrow evening's Council meeting! [Media release]

Green Councillor Samir Jeraj will propose a motion at the 27 January
meeting of Norwich City Council calling for the Council to back a
campaign to bring the railways back into public ownership. This comes
at the same time as the franchised rail services being provided by
National Express have started to cut jobs in Norwich.

Councillor Jeraj said: "It is deeply concerning that National Express
are cutting jobs. It's common sense to see that the quality of service
will be dramatically affected by this."

"Instead of running the railways for profit, every pound of income
should be reinvested to improve the service and keep fares down.
Last year, National Express announced pre-tax profits of
£90 million, a rise of 9%."

"Rather than seeking ways to carry on with a failed system of private
ownership, we should be looking to create a system of public ownership
which puts tax payers and rail users in control of railway services."

"Rail renationalisation also needs to be combined with localisation.
An example of this would be for train lines such as the Wherry and
Bittern Lines to be owned and managed by a cooperative made up of its
passengers."

 

Cllr. Rupert Read, Green Party Transport Spokesman and prospective Green
Party MEP for East Anglia, who will be seconding the motion, added: "There
has been a lot of talk about 'joined-up government'. Well, it is high time
for joined-up railway services in this county and this country -- and that
means it is just common sense to renationalise the railways. After all,
what's good enough for the banks is good enough for the railways!"