DARREN CAPLAN Introduction to The Railway Industry magazine

Welcome to the summer edition of the Railway Industry magazine for RIA members, which includes interviews with Transport for London Commissioner, Andy Lord, Aileen Thompson at HS2 and Mark Phillips at the Rail Safety and Standards Board.

We also report on our recent RIA Dinner and Railway Industry Supply Excellence (RISE) Awards, held on 29 June at London’s Intercontinental, Park Lane. Awards were presented to 11 winners – including Andy Lord for ‘Client of the Year’ - and our special guests at the event included Rail and HS2 Minister, Huw Merriman, and Lead Director of the Great British Railways Transition Team, Anit Chandarana.

At the event I had a chance to lobby the Minister and his Department in my speech, and promote a vibrant, growing and increasingly used rail network to railway industry colleagues, and the need for them to join what I call ‘Team Optimism’ at a time when a striking number of politicians, officials and rail players are inexplicably talking the sector down.

The evidence that rail is growing again and that more capacity will be needed in the years ahead to accommodate it is clear and is something we at RIA have been commenting on since the pandemic ended. Freight returned to 100% pre-Covid levels in 2021 (although industrial action has impacted it more recently) and by April this year the daily average for passenger numbers was at 98.3% with it reaching 101-106% on 14 out of 30 days in the month. Revenues too are trending upward, with leisure revenues even higher than pre-pandemic and commuting nudging mid-90%.

In the face of this bounce back, it is a real concern that some people continue to talk down the figures and speak of the future of rail in terms of ‘managed decline’. This is really damaging the railway industry and damaging it right now.

Earlier in June I attended RIA’s Trailblazers Reception, with a diverse group of more than 200 future and existing rail leaders. A common theme of the speeches that night was that we are competing for talent with other sectors, and that rail is a hidden jewel, with so many great jobs and interesting areas to work in.

At the event, figures from the National Skills Academy for Rail were cited, telling us that in rail we need to double our annual apprentice numbers to 5,000 every year and find 150,000 new workers by 2030, if we are to have the workforce we need by 2030. How can we attract that diverse and younger workforce to a ‘hidden jewel’ sector if we don’t ourselves promote the returning strength of the UK rail network? Using lower passenger and revenue figures and caveats simply makes it harder to attract new customers, new workers and

Milda Manomaityte • Innovation Director

Neil Walker • Exports Director

Robert Cook • Policy Director

Rose Garber • Member Relations Director infrastructure investors into UK rail. We should remember that we - the supply sector – are a huge part of the railway industry’s jobs, GVA and tax revenues, and we are the decarbonisers, levelling-uppers, and the optimists who can play a major part in delivering the increased capacity UK rail will need in the years ahead. As I said at the RIA Dinner, rail is not declining and we need Rail and HS2 Minister, Huw Merriman “to take that message back to the Treasury in no uncertain terms”.

I went on to give Minister Merriman a bucket list of 10 things he could crack on with before the next General Election, including progressing Great British Railways and rail reform legislation, to bring track and train and cost and revenue closer together and incentivise train operators to increase revenues rather than everyone focusing solely on cost. We will be campaigning on this, and all the other issues identified by RIA members in the months to come.

We will have an excellent opportunity to review progress on that bucket list when we gather for the RIA Annual Conference and Dinner on 1-2 November. Minister Merriman, Network Rail CEO, Andrew Haines, and a host of other great speakers will be joining us.

As I write, news has just come in that HS2 Ltd CEO, Mark Thurston, is to step down in September after six and a half years in the role. We at RIA thank him for his strong engagement with us and wish him well in the future. There are now big shoes to fill in the leadership of the HS2 project.

Darren Caplan Railway Industry Association Chief Executive

Michael Burrell Editor

THE RAILWAY INDUSTRY MAGAZINE IS PRODUCED BY

RAILWAY INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION

Darren Caplan • Chief Executive

David Tonkin • Chairman

David Clarke • Technical Director

Gaynor Pates • Operations Director

RAILWAY INDUSTRY ASSOCIATION

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Christian Wolmar