Labour's bid to renationalise Britain's railways: What does Keir Starmer plan ... trends now
Labour today unveiled plans to renationalise the railways if they win the general election.
Sir Keir Starmer's party are pledging to transfer train operators to public ownership within the first five years of a Labour government.
This will be done by folding existing private passenger rail contracts into a new public sector body - known as 'Great British Railways' - as they expire.
Labour claimed this will see the rail network renationalised 'without the taxpayer paying a penny in compensation costs'.
They also said simplifying the rail network will save taxpayers £2.2 billion a year.
But industry chiefs warned Labour were chasing a 'political rather than a practical solution' to Britain's struggling railways.
They claimed Labour's plan would see 'increased costs over time' and said a loss of 'commercial focus' would lead to less train services and increased subsidies.
It is also feared that transferring the cost of leasing rolling stock from private to public balance sheets would cost up to £10billion over the next Parliament.
Meanwhile, the Tories warned that Labour's plans were 'unfunded' and the party was using Wales - where there is low passenger satisfaction with publicly-owned rail services - 'as a blueprint'.
Shadow transport secretary Louise Haigh set out Labour's plans to renationalise the railways if they win the general election
What is Labour's plan?
Labour have set out plans to deliver 'a unified and simplified rail system that relentlessly focuses on securing improved services for passengers and better value for money for taxpayers'.
Under their proposals, this will be done by folding existing private passenger contracts into the newly-created Great British Railways as they expire.
Labour's proposals were set out in a 26-page document
GBR will be an 'arm's length public body' and is described as a 'directing mind in charge of Britain's railway infrastructure and services'.
It will be 'responsible for the day-to-day operational delivery of the railways, for ensuring infrastructure and services work together, and for innovations and improvements in the experience of passengers and freight users', according to Labour's 26-page plan.
A new watchdog called the Passenger Standards Authority will also be established by Labour.
The party intends to introduce automatic delay and cancellation refunds, make digital season tickets available on all networks, and make timetables, tickets and fares more integrated.
There are additional proposals to move mobile services on trains towards 5G and improve the integration of rail travel with bus and cycle hire services.
Which train operators will be nationalised?
Under Labour's plan, almost all passenger train operators will be transferred into public ownership within the first term of a Starmer government.
This will see the nationalisation of Avanti West Coast, c2c, Chiltern Railways, CrossCountry, East Midlands Railway, Gatwick Express, Grand Central, Great Northern, GWR, Greater Anglia, London Northwestern Railway, London Overground, Merseyrail, South Western Railway, Southern, Stansted Express, Thameslink, and West Midlands Railway.
Sir Keir Starmer's party are pledging to transfer train operators to public ownership within the first five years of a Labour government
Which lines are already under public control?
Labour have pointed to how many failed train franchises have already been put into public ownership by the Tories.
And the last Labour government previously brought rail infrastructure into public ownership and control in 2001 following the collapse of privatised Railtrack.
LNER, Northern, Transport for Wales, Southeastern, Scotrail, Caledonian Sleeper, and Transpennine Express are all currently publicly-owned.
The Government-owned 'Operator of Last Resort' controls LNER, Northern, Southeastern and Transpennine Express after they suffered a myriad of failures under private operators.
During the Covid pandemic, all train companies were effectively renationalised after ministers assumed the financial risk when passenger numbers dwindled almost to zero.
What other train operators are there?
Labour will still allow privately-owned 'open access' train operators - such as Grand Central, Heathrow Express, Hull Trains, and Lumo - to run services.
These are operators that don't receive any subsidies from the Government for running trains with all their revenue self-driven.
They use spare network capacity to supplement existing train operators on some lines.
Under Labour's plan, freight operators on the rail network will also remain within the private sector.
The Tories claimed Labour's 'unfunded' plans would mean higher taxes as they warned Sir Keir's party had not set out where future investment in the railways would come from
How much will Labour's plan cost?
Labour claim their plan could see taxpayers saved as much as £2.2billion a year.
They pointed to how the Government itself has estimated that simplifying the rail network could save around £1.5billion a year.
This was a figure included in a review of the rail network by Keith Williams, which was commissioned by Tory minister Grant Shapps when he was transport sectretary.
Labour have said their own analysis suggests the current running of the railways in Britain wastes
