Morethan - Aslef

14 Interview
The ASLEF JOuRNAL
Andrew Adonis on rail, the
Election and the Lords
Chris proctor went to meet Lord (Andrew) Adonis, Secretary of State for Transport,
just before the minister embarked on his General Election campaigning visits to 50
constituencies – all by rail. On the day they met, the media was full of reports of
Andrew calling for Lib dem supporters in marginal constituencies to vote Labour in
order to keep the Tories out. This was our starting point …
Cp Do you think your call for tactical voting
will have any success
LA I start from the position that it is clearly
important to have a Labour government. I see
basic similarities between Lib Dem voters and
Labour supporters. We share ideas about
public services, we’re pro-rail, we want fair
taxes and political reform and we’re both pro-
Europe.
The Tories are in a different place. They
don’t share these values. So where a Lib Dem
can’t win, surely their voters still want the
government to share their progressive policies.
So I called on them to vote Labour.
Cp Do you think voters have that level of
political sophistication – won’t they just vote
on the usual tribal basis
LA I believe that people have a rational
approach to politics. They know and
understand the fundamental issues. I believe
there is only a tiny minority of voters who want
to go back to the 80s and to the Thatcherite
policies that electing the Tories would
produce. The progressive majority – and that
includes many Lib Dems - are behind Labour.
Cp Tell me about your own journey from
the Liberals to Labour.
LA I was a councillor in Oxford for the Lib
Dems when I was in my twenties. You have to
remember that at that time Labour and the Lib
Dems were even-stevens in terms of support. I
favoured a mixed economy and an
independent deterrent, and Labour was
utterly split on both issues at the time. But
both parties were attractive to a social
democrat like myself and it was no great step
to join Labour under Tony Blair.
As a social democrat I wanted to support a
party which was capable of implementing its
vision. So my choice was between Labour –
who could – and the Lib Dems – the third
party that couldn’t.
So I’m now practicing what I’m preaching.
Cp Do you worry for transport if the Tories
are elected
LA If the Tories are elected, transport
services will be cut. Seriously. That is inevitable
because they want to introduce faster and
harsher cuts in public spending than we are
proposing. That will mean less public
transport, and hit the railways especially hard.
That is because rail needs sustained long term
investment. Labour has vastly increased
spending on rail over the last 13 years. A Tory
win would mean service cuts, end
infrastructure improvements and throw into
question Labour’s other proposed
improvement programmes.
It’s obvious that they can’t cut public
services and support new projects. It’s one or
the other.
Cp How do you react to Conservative
allegations that your department – the
Department for Transport – is too ‘hands-on’
and tries to run the franchises
LA It’s not true. We don’t want to micromanage
the industry. But we do want to set
minimum standards.
The public puts £3 billion a year into the
railways and has a right to know what it is
getting in exchange. To impose no minimum
standards would open the whole industry up
to blatant profiteering at the expense of
standards. That won’t happen while I am
Secretary of State.
The Tories need to understand how
franchising works. It is a system of regional
monopolies and monopolies need to be
regulated in the public interest. If the Tories
dropped minimum standard conditions it
would lead to unreliability across the service
with reduced ticket office hours, stations and
services.
Cp Do you support the Labour Party
manifesto welcoming franchise bids from notfor-profit,
mutual or cooperative enterprises
LA I welcome it. There is no reason why all
franchises should be in the hands of private
companies. If we get a good bid from a notfor-profit
enterprise I’ll treat it seriously. I hope
it will happen.
Network Rail works on this basis, and no
matter what criticisms it has levelled at it, it’s
an improvement on Rail Track.
Cp As a peer, how do you feel about calls
for the abolition of the House of Lords
“
IF THE TORIES ARE
ELECTEd, TRANSpORT
SERvICES WILL bE CuT
ANd THAT WILL HIT THE
RAILWAyS HARd
”
LA I support electoral reform and an
entirely elected second chamber. I’d really like
to be involved in an election myself now. The
current system of appointment and
inheritance in the Lords is outdated and
wrong. I am part of it, yes: because you can’t
deny the existence of something just because
you don’t like it.
The key issue is that all representatives
must be publicly accountable.