West Somerset Railway General Discussion

I can think of other railways where that verdict must have sent a shiver down some spines.....

 

On the delay thing, this feels like exaggeration for effect. I recall mention somewhere else of this, I think it was someone questioning whether the concrete foundations were suitable for the marshy land they were in. So someone, maybe @FrankC had to go round the whole thing again to check it was all ok, and it was. This was in a background of some extraordinary moaning about the WSR and social media. Maybe it did take 10 days to get to the bottom of, but I'm bemused at the idea that this put the final finishing date back by 10 days too. Suspect someone's trying to overegg the situation to make a point to fit their agenda.

On an entirely different note, does anyone else think just over an hour for all that felt a little short?. I've sat in longer steam gala meetings and bimonthly guards management meetings! I wonder how much discussion and interaction is had between parties, and how much is just the Plc telling everyone else what it is that they're doing. Just my interpretation, I appreciate minutes can be a poor representation of what actually went on during a meeting.

 

Well, you can't shoot the message, can you?

 

Logged on to reply to post#37783 to find its no longer visible here. I strongly object to the comment that minutes do not always reflect what when on in a meeting. Only those present can judge that and these minutes were double-checked before being placed in the public domain. Normally they would only be approved and published after the next meeting - which could be up to 3 months later.

Also the comment about a short meeting is nonsense - since online meetings have become the norm due to COVID, I have clerked over 100 meetings in various statutory and voluntary organisations. All, without exception, have been much shorter as they have been more focussed within the private conversations and other diversions going on. This meeting was no exception to that.

I did want to report this post, but as its not displayed here, I can't - but hope my comments are picked up by a moderator and dealt with.

 

Apologies for any offence caused, I did not mean to cast any aspersions on you, it was merely a general point that inevitably minutes aren't a transcription service.

 

No one here has said it will put back the completion date by 10 days. The completion date is dependent on all sorts of things including, mainly, various equipment supply, but the completion of the REB base isn’t one of them. By the way, the REB should be delivered late this coming week or early next week.

 

"The Plc Board had agreed at a meeting on 25 May 2021 to launch another public appeal to help under-pin the operational costs. It had been decided that to avoid politics, the Plc would go ahead alone in this appeal. The target would be £1m [..] The Heritage Trust and Association would be asked to provide project funding within their objectives."

It strikes me as odd that at a meeting of stakeholders designed (as I understand it) so all parties work co-operatively and with a brief to co-ordinate fundraising, the PLC announces to the others it's independently going to raise funds and that working co-operatively with other stakeholders would be too 'political', but they'll be expected to support it anyway.

The PLC's decision not to proceed with reorganisation "had been taken in the best interests of the company" presumably invites other stakeholders to consider their own interests first too.

The tone feels 'wrong' to me.

Patrick

 

I can see a post numbered #37783

Don't know why you can't.

 

What has changed within the WSR that means the second covid relief grant was refused?

 

It was a different set of people first time round, other than that, who knows!

 

The tone is completely wrong, but look at who is being quoted as saying it.

The WSR Plc board has unfortunately been made up of people who lack decent communication skills, and were very good at making a bad situation worse by a bad choice of words, until recently. Thankfully there are people like Frank Courtney now on the board who I'm sure could have provided the same answer with some better choice of words and better explanation, and the decision made wouldn't have felt 'wrong'.

 

Indeed they didn't because Mr Jones-Pratt rarely, if ever, comments on here, but he is quoted as saying in the latest PDG meeting, " A picture of the works on social media had caused a 10-day delay to the work whilst checks were made. This had made the situation difficult to manage." Admittedly it wasn't said that this delay was to works on the critical path, but if it wasn't, why was it mentioned? I am sure that there have been other delays in non-critical areas, indeed, virtually no project is completed without them.

 

The original post annoyed me. I rarely log on - usually when others notify me of something which concerns me personally. When I logged in, this post was missing completely. I therefore made the post I did. I do not have the tech knowledge to understand why I could not see it. I have received and will accept the apology made. Having logged on to write this reply, post #37783 is still missing from my screen.

 

Let's not beat about the bush, what else do we expect other than plc prevarication and control freakery ?

Nothing is going to change with the current management situation because it's all 'my way or the highway', bullying and bovine ordure.

 

I was a little worried, thanks for the clarification! The ignore option was my presumption, yet my apology was apparently visible? Never mind, I think...