Christmas is the time when families get together . To do that, people have to travel and for most of us, the choice to do so is by car or by public transport.

Yet more disruption due to broken industrial relations

Last week, the RMT union agreed to accept an offer over pay. Aslef did not. Passengers this weekend were subject to delays and cancellations attributed to industrial disputes.

The dispute that was suppose to have caused South West Trains to close an entire line from London to Exeter on Sunday was not mentioned by any announcement. Passengers turned up at stations to find trains were not running. They were told this was down to strikes, but this was only part of the story.

Hi Henry, due to Industrial Action taking place today no services have operated west of Yeovil Junction. ^TW

— SWR Help (@SW_Help) December 3, 2023

There were no trains running anywhere between Exeter and London on Sunday, on this main line.

Mainlines closed due to shoddy maintenance

Twitter told another story, a story of crumbling infrastructure

⚠️We’re really sorry for the disruption to @SW_Help customers after our engineers discovered structural defects to a pedestrian footbridge over the railway near Woking today. 👇 /1 pic.twitter.com/xwT81NTEXm

— Network Rail Wessex (@NetworkRailWssx) December 3, 2023

For the second time in three weeks, the main lines to the South West of England were unable to travel through Woking.

Long term closure of a main line for “engineering works”

We started our journey on the Dorset/Somerset border. To get to Salisbury station, we had to take a cab 20 miles as bus replacements between Yeovil and Salisbury were not in action. This doubled our cost of travel .

Hi, if you travel between 25 Nov and 10 Dec the lines between Yeovil and Salisbury are closed due to planned engineering works taking place with some services replaced by bus and others diverted with journey times extended. ^TW

— SWR Help (@SW_Help) December 3, 2023

Drivers blamed for track closure

On arrival at Salisbury, we were told that trains were not running to London due to “industrial action”, though we now know this to be an “untruth” – it was due to the crumbling bridge.

We were diverted via Southampton on a GWR train and then routed back to London via Havant , making our 80 minute journey into a 180 minute journey.

We were herded from platform to platform at Southampton and finally forced into over-crowded carriages with no explanation and no apology.

South West trains do not offer so much as a trolley service for passengers, rolling stock on the Exeter London line is 40 years old. The journey times are longer than they were when I was a child in the 1970s.

Travel as usual

The public take all this with the resignation that comes from habitual disappointment.

This is the reality of our railway system. It is a terrible indictment of our under-investment in our own infrastructure. At a time when we should be encouraging people to give up unnecessary car journeys, we are making the car essential. Rather than letting the train take the strain, the train is the strain.

The station staff at Salisbury station did not deliberately tell lies, they weren’t being told what was going on, but instead given the wrong information about “industrial action”.

The staff are patient with passengers and we are patient back, the problem is not with the people who look after passengers but with those who aren’t looking after the rail system.

I will be travelling down this Exeter line again for Christmas. I will do so with no confidence of when I will arrive or whether by train, bus or taxi.

A sustainable plan for the future needs proper investment

We can and should do better, we need to convert our huge national wealth into better service for ordinary people wanting to get around the country. We do not need to load our railways with debt, we need proper long-term investment from long-term investors. I suspect you know who I mean!