Great Western Railway delay repay

Mon 25 Nov, 17:11 (last edited on Mon 25 Nov, 17:11)

A quick Google search reveals:

"Graham Sutherland, the CEO of FirstGroup, the owner of Great Western Railway (GWR), received an £800,000 bonus in 2024. This was on top of his salary of £567,000, bringing his total pay to £1.4 million."

The guy who actually runs the railways services is doing more than OK. His salary could potentially pay for over 23 more drivers if I have got the maths right...

Don't blame the drivers for poor management/policies - and nurses should definitely be paid more...

Sun 24 Nov, 15:25

I clearly remember Susie, that during Covid you said on the forum that nurses shouldn't get paid any more as it was a vocation.

As for train drivers not being qualified, maybe you would like to be responsible for a nine carriage HST with around 50 passengers per carriage, that you have to get from A to  B safely.

Sun 24 Nov, 14:10 (last edited on Sun 24 Nov, 14:13)

You say that £60 is what most people need but what about nurses who are no way paid that much!  Why are people who save lives paid much less than those who drive a train and continually strike!   Nurses have only been on strike once!

Sun 24 Nov, 13:56

This article is two years old, so during the height of the strikes, but it compares how much drivers are paid with other rail staff alongside that of the management.

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jun/23/railworkers-and-what-they-earn-who-are-the-real-fat-cats

There is currently a big recruitment drive to attract more drivers given that a majority are reaching retirement age, and as Richard has said, most train companies rely on drivers working overtime, which most drivers now don't need to do.

£60,000 might seem a lot but that is now the salary most of us need to get a mortgage or pay rent, have a family, commute, buy food, pay council tax, utilities, and then if you live in Oxford or London. that salary is not enough. 

And we can't employ drivers from the EU, because, Brexit. And even if we did, they would be paid the same as UK drivers because they are working in the UK! 

Sun 24 Nov, 12:37

British train drivers are well paid because of privatisation. Turns out that some of the train companies (*cough* Virgin *cough*) decided it was cheaper to poach drivers from other companies rather than training any up themselves – if you look on railway forums from 10+ years ago this is well documented. Repeat that over 25 years and you have significant wage inflation. Ah, the efficiencies of the free market!

Personally I don’t have an issue with paying a good wage for someone on whose shoulders rest the lives of 650 passengers.

The particular issue with GWR (and other companies) right now is that the galaxy brains in the previous Government, having belatedly noticed what was going on, decided “we’ll fix all this by imposing a pay freeze in a time of high inflation”. This led to strikes. Who could have foreseen that, etc. etc.

The new Government agreed a (slightly below) inflation pay deal for the drivers, which brought the strikes to an end. As you’d expect, it was backdated for the last two years. This means a tidy lump sum has arrived in the drivers’ pay packets. All straightforward so far.

Except GWR et al don’t actually employ enough drivers. The only way they can run the published timetable is if drivers agree to work overtime. Thanks to the tidy lump sum, fewer drivers are bothered about working overtime right now. Particularly because, if they do, it might tip them over into a higher tax bracket for this year.

There are quite a lot of people in Government who really shouldn’t be put in charge of anything more complex than a Hornby train set.

Sun 24 Nov, 10:51

I think, Emily, the reason the train drivers salary and cost of employing them came up was to show how many more drivers GWR could employ if they didn't have to pay all that delay repay!

Sun 24 Nov, 10:27

British train drivers are paid double the western European average, and three to four times the EU

Without a driver ( and a guard for some union based reason ) the trains can’t run , so in essence the drivers do actually run the railway services, because without them the complete system fails and consequently messes up the lives of the many people that have been encouraged and need to use this method of transport.

Recent experiences of the termination of trains due to lack of drivers is becoming more regular - therefore the ‘ abysmal service ‘ is the result.

The increase of repayments, compensation and the delay repay speaks for itself with the quantum as stated ( if accurate ). No driver = no train= messing up the plans of every traveller and the consequential knock on this causes.

In a monopoly industry the customer has no choice and is reliant on what we have to accept. It would be great to use public transport more, but its too expensive, restrictive, unreliable. Obviously the management and Network Rail have to take responsibility, but why not employ drivers from the EU , like the NHS !  Before the introduction of driverless trains !

Sat 23 Nov, 19:08

The drivers salary has increased because they, unlike most sectors, have excellent union representation and can actually negotiate robustly with the government. As I've said before, it should be a race to the top, not the bottom.

And asking again, what do drivers' salaries have to do with delay repay and the abysmal service? Unless the drivers are actually running GWR!!!

Sat 23 Nov, 13:51 (last edited on Sat 23 Nov, 13:56)

Alan , and all , not sure how the calculation of the salary against the total cost can double ? As NI contributions have only increased by 2% , unless they get a huge pension contribution as part of the overall package in the monopoly of their ability to provide an essential service ! An interesting calculation….. if this is known . The cancellation of many trains due to not having an available driver , happens more often now they have the pay award ? Striking train drivers have enjoyed bumper pay hikes of up to 62 per cent in recent years – more than double the rate of inflation over the same period.

Industry figures  show the average driver's salary has surged by more than a third – 34 per cent – since 2012.

Sat 23 Nov, 13:36

I'm not sure what the salary of train drivers have got to do with the poor service of GWR? 

Except of course to trot out the tired trope that they are all paid far too much compared X,Y,Z and how dare they, rather than directing your anger towards those who privatised the railways, GWR's shareholders, the previous government who gave them their contracts and the lack of investment in the infrstrature, also the responsibility of the last few Tory governments. 

But it's easier to go for the train drivers, isn't it?

Sat 23 Nov, 13:33

Average salary of a train driver may be £60,000, but the cost of employing them (NI etc) is probably nearer £120,000 per year, so only about 240 drivers.  Also, whilst the delay may have been to a GWR train (so GWR were liable for the delay repay) but the cause could have been due to Network Rail (signalling problem, someone hit by a train, someone bashing a bridge).

Sat 23 Nov, 10:19

Average salary for a train driver = £ 60000.00

£ 28,85000.00  is 480 drivers 

Is this correct ? How many Train drivers are employed by GWR ?

Thu 21 Nov, 20:42

Yes, it's a great system:  I keep being surprised by little presents from GWR, which must account for at least a small amount of the £28,000,000 increase.

Thu 21 Nov, 20:35

You can now opt in to an (partially) automated 'Delay Repay' service, so that could account for a fair amount! 

Thu 21 Nov, 20:07

The government figures for delay repayments from GWR make interesting reading. Three years ago payments totalled £779,000. Last year’s total was £28,850,000……. I know more people are aware and claim these days but that’s a big increase. Doesn’t suggest the service is improving.