Re: National Rail Corp

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

In article <37D77D6D.7F71B30A@acay.com.au> Bob <alco@acay.com.au> writes:
>Date: Thu, 09 Sep 1999 19:27:09 +1000
>From: Bob <alco@acay.com.au>
>Subject: Re: National Rail Corp

>Many senior people in freightcorp are talking about "when they take over NRC" these days. My
>understanding is that Freightcorp are now allowed to bid after recent changes to the "rules".
>I'm told that Freightcorp are looking for a partner to go in with them on a 50/50 arrangement.
>If you consider that NSW already owns 40% of NRC it would not be unrealistic to see another 10%
>sold to freightcorp under such a proposal.
>Cheers
>Bob

Im a bit surprised that freightcorp would want to buy NRC as currently 
Freightcorp are in a pretty good position to start running a fairly decent
interstate rail service.
They have enuf locos and rolling stock to do this although it would mean 
getting all the 80s back into service and firing up some of the stored 
electrics to release 81s for interstate work.
Importantly also Freightcorp own outright a lot of their locos and carry no 
debt, at least in the case of the 80s and 81s.
The only thing Freightcorp dont have is access to terminals in all Mainland 
states,but buying NRC to get the terminals is a very expensive way to do it.
The only other reason would be to stop someone else getting it ,especially if 
the someone else was Qrail or Westrail.
Its a fair bet that Carr will privatise Freightcorp in the same way as kennet 
did with VLF.
Whilst privatising the NSW power industry was a difficult thing to do,I dont 
think there will be as much opposition to freightcorp being privatised.
It really depends on how successful the Olympics are and whether the State ends
up with a big debt or makes a profit.
Most Olympics these days lose money for the host city.

cheers
MD