Latest news with #Woking
BBC News
3 days ago
- Business
- BBC News
Woking Lib Dem MP Will Forster to stand down from council roles
The newly elected MP for Woking in Surrey has stepped down from his roles as borough and county councillor to "stand up for the community in Parliament".Will Forster MP has resigned from his role as Woking Borough councillor for Hoe Valley and Surrey County Council member for Woking South, with two by-elections for the vacant seats taking place in July, reports the Local Democracy Reporting long travel times between his Woking constituency, Parliament and county hall in Reigate led him to conclude residents would be better served by new said he was "incredibly proud" of his decade and a half in the council chambers but that the time had come to call it a day. Mr Forster said: "It has been the honour and privilege to serve my community as a Surrey county councillor for the past 16 years and as a Woking borough councillor for the last 14 years."Now, as Woking's first and new Liberal Democrat MP, I am continuing standing up for our community – both locally and in Parliament."However, this means I must step down as a councillor."The by-elections will take place on 10 wins will only have a short time in the position as the two councils are expected to be merged into a new mega authority within two years as part of the government's devolution plans.
BBC News
6 days ago
- General
- BBC News
Emily Place, Woking's new respite centre, opens for family breaks
A £5.7m centre to offer respite for families caring for adults with additional needs has been opened in Woking, Place features a sensory room, lounge and eight en suite bedrooms at the property in Goldsworth building was officially opened by Surrey County Council leader Tim Oliver, a year after construction mother whose daughter has made a five-night stay already, described it as "absolutely amazing". Mr Oliver said: "My wife and I know from personal experience how challenging it can be when a loved one has disabilities and additional needs, and the level of commitment that takes from parents and carers."It's about the right support, in the right place, at the right time – that's absolutely what we're trying to achieve."Sinead Mooney, cabinet member for adult social care, said: "I can see how people coming to use the facility will be very settled and very happy here, and the location is great – you've got facilities right on the doorstep that people can use and access."It's fantastic to see this place up and running." Jean, whose daughter has used the centre, said she had been able to drop her at Emily Lodge and "not panic"."The life of having a young adult with disabilities – or abilities, whichever way you want to go – is absolutely exhausting, so to have a few hours, a few days, a few nights, is irreplaceable" she in the centre will be allocated by the authority.
BBC News
28-05-2025
- General
- BBC News
Man arrested for kicking dog and waving firearm in Woking
An arrest has been made following reports of a man assaulting his dog and waving a suspected imitation firearm in incident happened in Ash Close, Woking, at about 20:00 BST on Monday.A 57-year-old man, from Woking, was arrested on suspicion of causing unnecessary suffering to an animal and possessing an imitation police attended the scene, and the dog was seized by officers and remains under their care, Surrey Police said. Anyone who witnessed the incident is urged to contact the force.
The Guardian
28-05-2025
- Business
- The Guardian
A great prize, but a great risk: why we all need the nationalised South Western Railway to work
A historic journey took place this week, when the first renationalised South Western Railway (SWR) service departed from Woking for Waterloo. Yet unfortunately, passengers had to disembark at Surbiton and board a rail replacement bus as a result of engineering work. The incident highlights that this is a moment of maximum vulnerability in the push for greater nationalisation in Britain. SWR is the first train company to be nationalised under this Labour government, which has plans to renationalise nearly all services in England by 2027. But at the launch, the transport secretary, Heidi Alexander, said she couldn't promise that nationalisation would yield lower fares. If services don't improve and fares don't fall, critics will have their attack line ready: 'We told you nationalisation doesn't work – just look at the trains.' It is critical that public ownership is seen to deliver better value for money, lead to reinvestment to improve services and genuinely meet the transportation needs of communities across Britain. Success or failure will shape attitudes towards it for years to come. Success could build momentum for bringing other essential services under democratic control. Failure will provide ammunition for privatisation advocates across every sector. The case for change is overwhelming. Since privatisation, rail fares have risen by a fifth in real terms, while analysis by the thinktank Common Wealth in 2023 found UK passengers pay five times as much per kilometre as those in France, where rail is publicly owned. Overall, privatised rail costs taxpayers £1bn more annually than public ownership would. This is extraction, not efficiency. Between 2006 and 2022, an estimated 65% of train operating company profits were paid out in dividends to shareholders, while passengers endured cancelled services and eye-watering fare increases. Our railways have become engines of profit for investors and overseas state enterprises, with the Italian, French and Hong Kong governments owning major franchises alongside global asset managers such as BlackRock. Labour's approach must address three critical challenges to ensure that nationalisation delivers tangible benefits rather than disappointment. First, the government must not stop at train operators. In 2022-23, the rolling stock companies, which lease trains and carriages to operators, saw their profits treble, with more than £400m paid to shareholders and profit margins rising to a whopping 41.6%. As the RMT union found, 87% of Britain's rolling stock is controlled by just three companies. Without nationalising rolling stock companies as well, train operating companies being brought into public ownership will continue to be beholden to enormous lease payments to private companies, as we saw between 2016 and 2024, when such payments rose by 78% in real terms (compared with staff costs, which attract much more controversy but only rose by 11%). These firms are extracting enormous profits while the public sector bears the risk. Nationalisation should mean bringing the entire system under democratic control, including the trains. Second, passengers must feel real benefits quickly. Travellers boarding these trains will not initially notice any difference, because the changes that matter – reinvestment rather than extraction, service improvements over dividend payments – will take time to materialise. Meanwhile, any delays, cancellations or fare increases will be attributed to public ownership, regardless of their actual cause. Plans for automatic refunds for late trains are a start, but change for commuters must not end there. The new public operator should freeze fares immediately and introduce simplified, integrated ticketing across the network. Revenue that previously flowed to shareholders should fund service improvements – more staff, better cleaning and extended opening hours at stations. Visible changes will build public support for broader transformations. Third, the government cannot simply replace private managers with civil servants. This means recruiting rail professionals and devolving decision-making to regional teams, rather than centralising everything in London. Most importantly, it means embedding passenger representation and worker participation from day one. There are signs that Labour understands the scale of the challenge. The party has committed to establishing Great British Railways as an integrated public body, moving beyond the fragmented structure that has plagued the network since privatisation. But integration on paper is not enough. It must translate into coordinated investment, simplified passenger experience and democratic accountability. Only when the entire system operates under public control can passengers fairly judge its performance. Labour's rail nationalisation represents more than transport policy – it's a test case for 21st-century public ownership. For this to succeed, passengers must pay less for better services, workers must have a voice in their future and communities must benefit from integrated planning rather than fragmented profit maximisation. As Common Wealth's research has shown, the economic case for rail nationalisation is clear. Now comes the harder task of making it work in practice. This requires courage to challenge vested interests, operational expertise to improve services and democratic innovation to ensure public ownership serves the public. If nationalised operators deliver visible improvements while keeping costs under control, public support will grow and opposition critique will ring hollow. But if it is business as usual with a different logo, we'll have squandered a once-in-a-generation opportunity to prove that public ownership works. The prize is enormous: affordable, reliable rail transport that serves communities rather than shareholders. The risk is equally significant: discrediting public ownership for years to come. Labour must get this right. Sarah Nankivell is deputy director of Common Wealth
Telegraph
25-05-2025
- Telegraph
I travelled on Britain's first renationalised train (and it took four times longer than usual)
'Rail Replacement Bus': three of the most depressing words in the English language. It's 5.08am, and rain is lashing at the prison-high walls of Woking station, a key commuter stop in the depths of Surrey, the steel shutters covering the entrance rattling but refusing to budge. It looks like a gloomy start for Britain's first nationalised rail service for 30 years. But then the sun comes out, the shutters lift and the train waiting on platform three is ready to leave. It's just deeply unfortunate for the Labour government that, on what should have been a rather momentous day in Labour's brave new world of rail renationalisation, over half of my journey to London is going to be replaced by a bus. Still, this hasn't thwarted the half a dozen hardy souls about to pile on board the 5.36am to Waterloo. For Rob Potter and his former colleague Steve, it's an excuse to crack open the Laphroaig single malt. 'Trains,' he says grandly, 'are the finest form of transport in the world.' Sadly, not many of the people he dealt with when he worked for South Western Railway as their customer services manager would have agreed. Rob Potter - a retired Rail worker who was in the Customer complaints department at South Western Railways toasts the re-nationalisation. Users of Tripadvisor, the travel website, have given the service so many one-star reviews it's hard to find anything positive about it. (Another passenger tells me about the time he saw another South Western Railway manager – not 60-year-old Potter, mercifully – sharing a box of Celebrations with passengers one Christmas, before being angrily mobbed for his troubles, such was the level of general discontent.) In fact, customer dissatisfaction is a major reason South Western Railway was replaced with a Government-run body when the franchise ran out at 1.59am on Sunday morning. Eventually, all the privatised rail companies will come back under government control. 'It's one promise Keir Starmer is keeping and should get credit for,' says Potter. But fellow passenger Guy Holmes, a member of Warwickshire County Cricket Club, is less optimistic. He's in a rush to get to the ground for his team's derby match against local rivals Worcestershire. His connection to Euston is crucial but complex. 'There are several permutations of the journey and other engineering work to contend with,' he tells me anxiously. Matthew Tam, a 27-year-old experimental physicist at University College London, is cut from a different cloth, however. He was first in the queue to board the train at Woking and is one of a smattering of train enthusiasts braving the tedious engineering works today. Last week he was filming a new tram in Liege and posts videos of his travels around Europe by bus and train on his YouTube channel. He says that when he isn't thinking about quantum computing, he thinks about the management, integration and optimisation of public transport networks. Remarkably, he finds that Britain's myriad small rail and bus companies adds a stimulating element of confusion that his former home in Hong Kong lacks. In what can only be described as a unique example of a 'glass half full' attitude, he thinks the uniformity, efficiency and punctuality of Hong Kong's public transport is 'boring'. 'Some of my friends don't really understand. Everything arrives on time and the trains don't break down,' he says. He sees the frequent breakdowns and service failures on the rail network as puzzles to be figured out (unlike regular passengers, who find them a pain in the proverbial). I've got until Surbiton, on the London/Surrey border, before the rail replacement bus section of the line kicks in. It doesn't take long to get there, but it's quite a feat that we've actually made it anywhere: the 455 electric locomotive pulling the eight carriages from Woking to Surbiton is, after more than 60 years in service, showing its age. Streaks of dirt mar its once cheery orange, blue and yellow livery. Inside, the plum-coloured plush on the seats is wearing thin. A new blue and silver livery has been unveiled to mark South Western Railway's transition back into public ownership, but the new trains are not all in service yet. 'The 455 is a reliable workhorse but it is in need of replacement,' says driver Richard Guy. After 13 minutes of views of suburban gardens through the slightly grimy windows, at 5.59am, it was all change. Further up the line, as the transport minister Heidi Alexander is preparing to pull out of Waterloo on a very short journey for the TV cameras –on a train with the brand-new silver and royal blue livery of Labour's flagship Great British Railways – we're decanted off the train at Surbiton to find the rail replacement bus to Clapham Junction. It's a bumpy double decker, and depressingly, it's going to take about an hour. Still, the bus is easy to find, and the service slowly fills up as people trickle off the train. Network Rail engineers in fluorescent orange overalls sit downstairs. They do not look sorry that their engineering work has disrupted the bank holiday timetable. Jithin Thomas, 27, goes further: 'I hope the administrative overhaul [the network co-ordinating more closely with the train operating companies] that's likely to happen will please passengers.' To be honest, though, it is unlikely that many commuters will notice any difference, at least at first. Just as privately owned South Western Railway has been replaced by publicly owned South Western Railway, the management structure and staff will stay the same – for now, it is just the ownership that has changed. But Thomas says profits will now go into improving the service instead of investors' bank accounts. One boring hour later, the bus arrives at Clapham Junction so that we can rejoin the tracks and catch the train into London. It's a long way from platform 15 (the closest platform to where our bus arrives) to platform three, but no one has to run – there's an interminable 26-minute wait before the connecting train leaves for Waterloo. Today Clapham Junction station, normally bustling even on a Sunday, is like the scene from the zombie movie 28 Days Later, where the hero emerges after being unconscious in hospital to find London's streets deserted. There were no zombies (apart from sleep deprived passengers), but several of our fellow train-then-rail-replacement-bus passengers give up on the last leg of the (second) train, and hunt down one of a number of other, regular buses that connect Clapham to Waterloo. Tam is also bored waiting for the Waterloo train, and says he might catch a regular bus instead. This is a big deal for him: he loves buses like he loves trains, just not quite as much. He points out the irony that the rail replacement bus is operated by FirstGroup, the same company that actually ran South Western Railway when it began 29 years ago. A rail replacement bus also replaced the train on the day that John Major's privatised rail network came into service in 1996. Clearly, old habits die hard. Still, the 26-minute wait at Clapham is over, and on we board again… and after 11 minutes, we finally arrive at our final stop. The 28 miles from Woking to Waterloo has taken two hours and 10 minutes, an average speed not much faster than the stagecoaches that would have carried passengers when Waterloo was given its name in 1848. Usually, the average length of a journey from Woking to London Waterloo, without engineering works, is 33 minutes. Today it has taken four times as long. From his eyrie above the concourse at Waterloo station, an eagle-eyed South Western Railway manager spots our cameras and comes dashing down to explain why the first renationalised train was a bus. He says it was a decision taken for the benefit of passengers who would normally have caught the 06:14, the first train on a Sunday morning. To avoid making them late getting to Waterloo and possibly missing a connection, they made the first train especially early to take into account the delays caused by engineering work. It is an elegantly plausible solution, but what about that 26-minute wait at Clapham Junction? It might take a quantum physicist to work it out – but he is already on a different bus.
