Re: 2 EL's on Patrick's

[mauried@commslab.gov.au (Maurie Daly)]

In article <8E7FE6459telstraNews@vic.news.telstra.net> Michael Kurkowski <mk@netstra.com.au> writes:
>Subject: Re: 2 EL's on Patrick's
>From: Michael Kurkowski <mk@netstra.com.au>
>Date: Mon, 15 Nov 1999 11:33:03 GMT

>And meanwhile, the truckies are laughing their way to the bank. As has been 
>stated many times before, competition among rail operators will cause the 
>railways eventual demise. 

>Do people not realise that interstate trucks are wasteful and dangerous? 

>Wasteful I say, because for what one train can pull, you need a huge amount 
>of trucks. More prime movers = more polution. More drivers = more money 
>spent.

>Dangerous I say, because many truck drivers work dangerous hours, and do it 
>illegally, i.e. keeping a second logbook, taking drugs to cope with the 
>long hours, getting very little sleep.

>I bet the trucking companies are sitting there laughing at the railways 
>right now. Pushing to allow bigger trucks into the cities to clog our 
>already congested roads.

>As far as the governments veiw on this goes, where the f*** is the logic? 
>Who else other than the government would sell of your biggest money making 
>asset? (i use Telstra as the example in this case, but the railways 
>certainly count too).

>Regards
>Michael

Governments traditionally take the easiest option when it comes to solving 
problems of any sort.
As far as rail goes , all of the recently completed inquiries into rail will 
tell the Govt what it doesnt want to hear , ie that large sums of money need 
to be spent on rail to make it competitive with road and to level the playing 
field.
There isnt a hope in hell of the Govt spending on rail what it will be 
recommended to spend, given the tight budgetary situation caused by business 
tax reform and the involvement in East Timor.
In addition , its pretty well known that the federal dept of Transport is pro 
road ,and this is where the feds get most of their advice from.
Given that the Feds have till now not responded to any of the Rail inquiries 
that they themselves commissioned,dont be surprised if all these reports are 
simply shafted into the bin .
We will hear some waffly rhetoric about the Feds injecting $250 M into the 
creation of ARTC and that the privatisation of NRC will provide much needed
private sector investment into the ailing rail network.
Also we will hear yet again how much money the feds have injected into AP to 
Darwin.
In my view however, the real blame for the whole mess is primarily one of the 
States, namely WA,NSW and QLD who have resisted implementing any form 
of real rail reform,and who have failed completely to cooperate with the Feds 
on the creation of ARTC as a one stop shop.
In short , its simply become too hard a problem to fix .
Its rumoroud that in 2002 , the feds will privatise ARTC , and then will have 
no involvement in rail in this country at all, which means that they wont have 
to worry about it any more , from a funding perspective.
If rail then goes down the tube , it will be the fault of the States and to a 
lesser extent the fault of the Rail operators themselves for cutting their own 
throats.
The average man in the street doesnt have a problem with large trucks on the 
roads , at least not in a political sense, and its very unlikely that large 
trucks will ever become a major political issue , at least not large enuf to 
displace a sitting Govt, so if rail completely goes down the drain , so what .

MD