Will she ever learn?

[Roland Perry]

In message , at 15:43:36 on Fri, 27 Jul

2018, The Natural Philosopher remarked:

But as I explained; and you either didn't read, or have forgotten, has no services subsidised by TfL.

[The Natural Philosopher]

It has.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Surbiton has a pretty reasonable overground service? The equal of an end of line tube service elsewhere?

The beauty of TFL is you can use any of its services with the same 'ticket'

I've often wondered why TFL chose to name that newish service the overground. It's essentially just a re-vamped railway service, using mainly existing tracks and stations.

At least crossrail says what it is.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Eh? Surbiton is within the TFL area. I doubt TFL provide figures of any subsidy route by route.

[charles]

It depends on whether you mean "above ground lines " - it has or "The Overground" and LT brand name for some surface lines it operates. - It hasn't. You need to to go to Clapham Junction to find that.

[Dave Plowman (News)]

Suburban rail services have been known as the overground for as long as I can remember. Don't approve of TFL hijacking the name for one line - what will they call the next similar they open, if they do?

The only difference is the type of carriage. More like an underground one seating wise - but with the additional benefit of easy movement between carriages (no doors). So maximum standing space. But basically just a train.

[Roland Perry]

In message , at 16:26:55 on Fri, 27 Jul

2018, The Natural Philosopher remarked:

It wasn't invented then, and today the nearest is at Richmond.

[Roland Perry]

In message , at 17:52:10 on Fri, 27 Jul

2018, "Dave Plowman (News)" remarked:

Completely off topic. The main difference is that Overground is subsidised from Londoners' council tax, the suburban rail services aren't.

[Roland Perry]

In message , at 17:14:05 on Fri, 27 Jul

2018, "Dave Plowman (News)" remarked:

TfL don't subsidise SWR. Period.

[Roland Perry]

In message , at 17:08:41 on Fri, 27 Jul

2018, "Dave Plowman (News)" remarked:

It has a good national rail service, but that's not subsidised by London Council Tax payers, via TfL.

And the reason the Mayor's price cap promise doesn't work for people in Surbiton is even though you might be seduced into thinking that a Travelcard is somehow a "TfL ticket", the element set aside for trips on TOCs like SWR can't be frozen via the kind generosity of London Council Tax payers.

[The Natural Philosopher]

'overground' was not specified with a capital O...

FRankly I dont give a shit, but having both been born in Surbiton and spent 7 years of by life going through it on a train, I just felt the statement '*and* no overground?' was inapplicable.

[Robin]

I'm with you on much of the above as ISTM you did capitalise Overground. But on a pointy of detail I think TfL's operating subsidy comes from business rates.

The council tax pays for the revenues lost due to the Freedom Pass; is in my view not a subsidy so much as a bulk purchase; and does go to both TfL and to TOCs. At least it did last time I looked at the almighty complex system of annual settlements with TfL and the ATOC and London Service Permit route operators, and apportionment between boroughs. (I gave it a firm and manly look; and then moved on.)

[Roland Perry]

In message , at

20:57:40 on Fri, 27 Jul 2018, Robin remarked:

Like yourself, I don't have a great deal of enthusiasm for drilling down into what grants, what inputs to government pay for the grants etc.

Out in the provinces I think the "bus pass" schemes are paid for much more directly linked to actual ridership data. Very few are valid for any form of rail travel though.

[michael adams]

One might indeed normally do that. But in this case had one been reading the newspapers over the past two years - ever since the referendum in fact - one might have been struck by continual references to the fact of London's contributing such a large percentage of the GVA both of the UK and of England.

Of course had one forgotten this, although I find it hard to imagine how one possibly could, one might I suppose need to refresh one's memory.

Total GVA (? million) GVA per head UK 1,747,647 26,339 England 1,498,221 27,108 London 408,479 46,482 South East 258,902 28,683 North East 50,675 19,218 North West 166,542 23,068

That would only make sense were one able to produce any kind of satisfactory explanation as to why people who receive more in benefits than they pay in taxes should be consistently more productive than anyone else.

So can one ?

Or rather than making up fanciful examples bearing no relation to reality, might one instead take advantage of the wonders of the world wide web and look things up for oneself ?

Fat chance !

So that in the above example Londoners are twice as productive as workers in the North West and well over twice as productive as workers in the NE. While London alone is responsible for 23% of the the GVA of the UK as a whole and 27% of that of England. Whereas astonishingly, if the figures are to be believed, the NE former home of Swan Hunter, Dormman Long, Vickers Whitworth, etc etc is responsible for a mere 2.8% of UK GVA and 3.3% of English GVA.

And we all know who voted most strongly in favour of Brexit, now, don't we boys and girls ? As the newspapers have been reminding us ad-nauseam for the past two years. Well some of us, anyway.

michael adams

...

[michael adams]

Indeed. But then that does raise the question as to why, in an earlier post, when you stated

"And as a London resident I'd find it hard to explain to people outside London why central government should give TfL more of their taxes to subsidise travel in London while Londoners' enjoy a fares freeze."

you didn't simply explain to these people outside London that it wasn't really a fares freeze at all ?

Why would you find it hard to explain, or even want to explain a fares freeze which wasn't actually a fares freeze, to anyone ?

When you had a clear opportunity there to criticise "the Mayor, TfL et al" for misleading people in that way, which you chose not to take.

Why was that ?

One might almost be forgiven for thinking that you didn't actually realise that it wasn't a real fares freeze, until after you'd made that first post. Until after I'd pointed this out to you; all references to which you pretended to ignore, by snipping them completely from your reply.

michael adams

...

[Brian Gaff]

Excuse me? This sounds like elitism, and saying lets kill the rest of the population off if they do not make any money. What kind of world is this? Brian

[michael adams]

I haven't mentioned any formula.

All I said was that the freeze applies to single fares only.

And that it does *not* apply to travel cards and oyster caps.

Where have I, or anyone else for that matter, ever said that travel cards and oyster top-ups of any kind, by whomsoever issued, *were* frozen ? An incorrect assumption in that respect may well have been current among the less well - informed, or the ideologically deranged, but then they may well consider all sorts of nonsense as being true, if it serves their own purposes .

michael adams

...

[michael adams]

While council tax payers who chose to use Tfl are subsidising themselves.

That's the bit I was having difficulty with.

People subsidising themselves.

michael adams

...

[Robin]

All those figures are positive. So if you knew all that I fail to understand why you claimed that "London, followed by the South East, and to a very small degree the East of England are the only areas of the UK which actually make a positive contribution to the UK economy".

No - because my example of the worker contributing £10,000 to GVA makes no such claim about productivity. Look at your own figures above for GVA per head - which are per head of population including the economically inactive population. So the £10,000 worker (even if only working part-time) is less productive than the average. But is still making a net contribution to the economy. This was not an accident.

[Roland Perry]

In message , at

09:13:04 on Sat, 28 Jul 2018, michael adams remarked:

It doesn't apply to National Rail single tickets within London.

Indeed, although they are cheaper than they would otherwise have been, because a major element of them (the TfL fares *has* been frozen).

The Mayor implied that they would be.

There is indeed a certain derangement afoot regarding which "heavy rail" services come within the purview of National Rail (and hence neither frozen nor subsidised by TfL), and which (the *O*verground) within TfL's purview.