A-Infos (en) France, OCL CA #338 - At the SNCF, things are going off the rails! (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

An incident, which occurred on the night of January 19 to 20, 2024 in 
very cold weather, caused talk of the Paris-Clermont railway line: while 
this journey is supposed to last three hours, the breakdown of a 
locomotive left 700 travelers without water , electricity or heating for 
eleven hours. A "nightmare" which, widely relayed by social networks and 
the media, led the Minister of Ecological Transition Christophe Béchu to 
summon the CEO of SNCF Jean-Pierre Farandou to ask him for a "plan of 
concrete and immediate measures"... within fifteen days. He can always 
dream.

"Is the SNCF Paris - Clermont-Ferrand line really the worst in France?», 
questioned 20 minutes on January 24. This line frequented by nearly 2 
million travelers was already one, in 2011, of the 12 "sick, saturated 
or problem lines" listed by the SNCF itself; in 2023, it counted 121 
delays of more than one hour, 33 of more than two hours and 38 train 
cancellations.
In addition, the latest spectacular incident on this route did not beat 
its record, established in 2019, where a train took fourteen hours to 
complete it. On the other hand, what has changed - at the national 
level, and no longer just locally - is that delays have lost their 
exceptional character in the eyes of everyone. Thus Frédéric Aguilera, 
vice-president of the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region in charge of 
transport, admits: "Today the equipment is so rotten that it is a mess.» 
And the general director of Intercités adds: "The equipment is so 
exhausted that every day we bet that it will hold up[1].» And the SNCF 
spokesperson admits: "There are so many under-investments that have not 
been made for years that we pay the price at some point.»

According to the collective "Clermont-Paris train users", the repeated 
material breakdowns on this section are due to "the obsolescence of the 
railway infrastructure" and "the failure of the equipment", the trains 
being over forty years old and locomotives over thirty years old. But we 
can draw the same assessment from other lines since, again according to 
the SNCF spokesperson, the Paris-Clermont connection in fact only 
occupies third place among French "galley lines". In first position, 
there is Bordeaux-Marseille, with 26.6% of trains arriving late at their 
destination last year; then we find Lyon-Nantes, with 21% delays. And, 
after Paris-Clermont, he cites Paris-Limoges-Toulouse (see the following 
article).
But what is behind this decline in "SNCF quality" - and in particular on 
the Intercités lines? Above all, the progressive reorganization by the 
SNCF of its "main line" services around the TGV alone. Before the 
appearance of this "high-speed train", the Intercités lines formed the 
backbone of the railway network, and they were an important regional 
planning tool by connecting the populations of metropolises and those of 
medium-sized towns[2]. Their disappearance in favor of more expensive 
routes which erase the stations by no longer stopping the trains 
conversely constantly reinforces territorial segregation.
In addition, the SNCF has organized its own competition, now offering 
car to home services, carpooling, regular coaches, etc. By diluting the 
railway activity in a more global "mobility" offer, it has aligned its 
policy with the "Road rather than rail" consensus in vogue in ruling 
circles.

On February 15, 2018, Jean-Cyril Spinetta, former CEO of Air France, 
presented Edouard Philippe, then Prime Minister, with a report on the 
future of rail transport[3]. He recommended, among other things: the 
refocusing of rail transport on TGV services between the main French 
metropolises; the modernization of "everyday trains in urban and 
peri-urban areas"; examining the maintenance of small lines with regard 
to their cost; a new status for the SNCF - the previous one dating 
from... 2014; the gradual disappearance of "railway workers" status, 
with plans for voluntary departure for two years.
The recommendations in this report were not surprising: they were 
inspired by "recipes" previously applied to other public companies - 
from France Telecom to EDF via La Poste. The government immediately took 
them on board, and announced the opening of a period of consultation 
with the unions with a view to their implementation. SNCF became a 
public limited company; the railway lines, and even the management of 
the network, have been opened to competition; the end of the "railway 
workers" status has been planned, as well as the elimination of services 
deemed unprofitable[4]...

From the Thatcher years to the Blair years, the United Kingdom set an 
example in terms of privatization and liberalization of public services. 
Water, rail, telecommunications, gas and electricity, post office, urban 
transport, prisons... everything has been there, apart from the national 
public health service, the NHS.
From the 1990s, the former public service British Rail was divided into 
pieces which were sold; the railway network and the management of the 
lines were dissociated, and the management of the lines itself was 
divided into several regional concessions; the train fleet has been 
entrusted to separate companies, which rent them at high prices to the 
line operators, providing their shareholders with millions in guaranteed 
profits from year to year...
But the privatization of the British rail network quickly degenerated: 
problems of coordination and loss of expertise led to numerous incidents 
- until the Hatfield train disaster which, in 2000, cost the lives of 
four people. The government found itself forced to renationalize the 
network in 2002, and it never attempted to re-privatize it.
The repeated bankruptcies and scandals did not stop there, because they 
also concerned the management of the lines themselves. Indeed, although 
train prices in the United Kingdom are among the highest in Europe 
(according to the British Department of Transport, they have increased 
by more than 23% since privatization in real terms, therefore taking 
into account the 'inflation), the quality of the rail service is as bad 
as that of the service provided in France by the SNCF: delays and 
cancellations of trains, crowded and dilapidated wagons... Also, in a 
2017 survey carried out for the "We Own It" campaign» ("It Belongs to 
Us"), which pushes for the renationalisation or remunicipalisation of 
public services in the United Kingdom, 76% of British respondents said 
they were in favor of a return to public control of the railway system 
as a whole.
In France, the leaders did not opt for an all-out privatization of the 
former public monopolies, but for their transformation. Air France, 
France Télécom, EDF-GDF, La Poste, SNCF, etc., have become commercial 
companies placed under more or less diluted control of the State, and 
which have profited both from their rent-seeking situation in France and 
government protection to expand abroad, including acquiring services 
privatized by other countries.
The law for a new railway pact passed in June 2018 thus enabled the 
"financial consolidation" of the SNCF Group: the State took over its 
debt to the tune of 35 billion euros "in order to increase its 
investment capacity in modernization and renovation of the railway 
network. This law organized the opening to progressive and 
differentiated competition, the end of status recruitment[5]and the 
negotiation of a "new social contract" (sic!).
Since 2020, SNCF has been made up of a holding company and five limited 
companies: SNCF Réseau, SNCF Gares & Connexions, Rail Logistics Europe 
and SNCF Voyageurs. The latter manages all of SNCF's passenger transport 
activities, including Ouigo (see box). SNCF forms, with the companies 
Keolis and Geodis, the SNCF Group. The State is the sole shareholder of 
SNCF, whose capital is non-transferable; and since 2010 it has also been 
the organizing authority for the so-called "territorial balance trains" 
(TET) that are the Intercités.

Coming back to the Paris-Clermont line, the State has launched a 
modernization program concerning it, with work on the network financed 
to the tune of 1 billion euros and with the arrival of new trains, 
called "Oxygène" , delivery and commissioning of which are planned for 
2026. However, there are already reports of major delays in the 
production of these trains and in the operation of this line...
Finally, as a large part of the investment for the "global regeneration 
of the network" must be fueled by the profits of SNCF Voyageurs, and as 
the SNCF must increase its contribution in the next four years, it finds 
itself confronted with contradictory injunctions. . For 2024 alone, the 
State is requiring an investment of around 1.7 billion euros, or 70% of 
its profits in 2022[6]. The SNCF will therefore have to run more trains 
with fewer resources; maintain Intercity rates; ensure (unlike its 
competitors) a larger part of the investment in the network while 
assuming the dysfunctions which are the responsibility of the State. At 
the same time, it has still not specified how the famous "100 billion 
euros" plan for rail by 2040 that former Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne 
announced on February 24, 2023 will be financed. .
On January 14, 2024, LFI MP Clémentine Autain foolishly attributed, on 
her Twitter account, the delay of a train she was on to the 
"privatization" of the SNCF. Immediately mocked for her blunder, she 
corrected the situation by declaring that, of course, the SNCF was not 
privatized, but that "opening up to competition and liberalization 
lead[ed]to a deterioration in traffic", and that the SNCF was "forced to 
prepare for profitability because it was opening up to competition".
It is my opinion that our travels will hardly improve...

Vanina

Notes:

1. "Clermont-Paris train: "We cannot cut Auvergne off from Paris for so 
long", waiting for concrete measures", FR3 Auvergne, January 24, 2024.
2. "When the French state sabotages the train", by Vincent Doumayrou, Le 
Monde Diplomatique, June     2016.
3. "SNCF reform: the aftermath of the Spinetta report", Vie publique 
website, February 26, 2018.
4. "Dismantling of the SNCF: 30 years late, will Macron repeat the same 
mistakes as the British?», by Olivier Petitjean, on Basta!, February 20, 
2018.
5. The special retirement plan was abandoned on January 1, 2021: railway 
workers hired after this date no longer benefit from it. SNCF management 
explains that the occasional daily cancellation of trains is due to a 
lack of drivers, because many of them have retired.
6. Initially, this share was set at 60%.

"Progress is only valuable if it is shared by everyone" is not a 
marketing lie. Indeed, observing as we do that progress is not shared by 
all, and therefore that it is worthless, the SNCF has reinvented with 
its "low cost offer" the 3rd class which had been abolished in France in 
1956. 2013, she treated us to her famous Ouigo...
But the Ouigos are different from the 3rd class of yesteryear: these 
trains almost all have the particularity of arriving at or departing 
from a station that is difficult to access. For example, we take you to 
Marne-la-Vallée-Chessy, forty-five minutes from Paris when public 
transport works well or there are no traffic jams - very improbable 
scenarios -, this which costs you 5 euros per person. Or you get off at 
Saint-Exupéry station, and it takes you about an hour and around 10 
euros per person to get to Lyon by public transport. There are also some 
Ouigo Paris-Lyons from Paris to Lyon; but if they are a little below the 
TGV for their price, their speed is fully Ouigo, it: count 5 hours...
In the 3rd class cars of yesteryear, the transport conditions were very 
uncomfortable, but at least we left from the same place as "the others" 
and we took the same time as them to reach our destination.

https://oclibertaire.lautre.net/spip.php?article4099
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