Lynton and Barnstaple - Operations and Development

Llangollen was pored over at great length, but in essence they ran an engineering subsidiary; that is a high-risk business since engineering work on steam engines is very hard to price accurately if you take on fixed price work; while if you do it at "cost plus" you run the risk of large parts of your estate housing projects that aren't actually bringing in any money, with the attendant inefficiency of working on several projects simultaneously in a stop-start manner. You need to be very good at management to do that profitably and arguably that is where Llangollen failed, which then led to financial contagion that crossed over into the core business of running trains.

As for hiring a fitter and tying that to the section 73 approval (or otherwise) - they are completely different tasks. If the railway feels it needs an engineering fitter, that will be because they need one now based on the current scale of operation - what happens with the S73 is irrelevant to the current engineering needs: at best it means you will have a larger engineering requirement some years in the future. One assumes that the current management have done their analysis on both the need and the impact on budget, but that will be based on the current scale of operation and budget. If you need a fitter now, you need a fitter. Linking the vacancy to the S73 outcome would be as illogical as saying "we won't order ice cream for our kiosk until we know the outcome of a planning application that might result in more visitors some years hence".

Tom

 

Holiday's? who having holidays ain't had one of those for the last five years. The NHS doesn't stop for no one. As for retirement well you might have time on your hands but with no money coming in, any you get goes to paying the bills.

 

Well that would be your choice. The NHS provide annual leave for their employees. If you choose not to take them, that is your perogative. A holiday can be a week spent at home watching films, or painting the bedroom. Not as enjoyable as a trip to Devon (other destinations are available), but life's what you make it.

 

Who said I’m retired or self-employed? My leave (including from volunteering commitments) may be well planned, but the details are sorted much nearer the time.

My point is not that it’s not a miss, but that the impact is probably not as huge as that.


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It did actually say in the advertisement for the vacancy that not only are they working on extending the line but that they currently have a staff vacancy due to forthcoming expansion

 

Seriously : take your holidays ! I went ten years with only a week's break when I had my own business and paid for it about fifteen years later with a complete breakdown ! Try to take at least two weeks together as it takes time to unwind.

 

Sadly that is what has happen to me now, it didn't help getting Covid twice and also having type 2 Diabetes, I have what is better known as Long Covid
and while I can keep going for a few hours each day, I am slowing getting better as some days can be to much. and other are good days.

There is much which is wrong in the NHS and the contract culture in the NHS means that there is never enough staff on duty to do what needs to be done.

I am in total support of all the NHS workers on strike, and it isn't all about the money but it does help. What most NHS staff members will tell you is need for a proper system of training more doctors, nurses and all the other ancillary staff that you need to keep a health system like the NHS running.

The one big NHS issue is the management Tree structure the tree itself in dying, so unless you cut back on so much of the branches which have not been kept in check we won't have an NHS in 10 year time.

 

The problem is that your advice, typical of a certain kind of accountant, is not based on practical considerations or understanding of the nature of the business concerned. Llangollen's problem has been accurately described by @Jamessquared above and bears no relationship to the L & B and the SVR has operated with a relatively high number of paid staff, unlike the L&B. On the other hand, by advocating delaying the employment of a fitter, you seem to be following the standard chair-bound accountant's advice to delay or reduce maintenance, oblivious of the cost of the damage done to machinery as a result. Does the saving of a fitter's wage for a few months really cover the cost of replacing parts or, possibly, the loss of use of a complete locomotive due to a lack of maintenance ? I would suggest that those cost far outweigh the cost of wages and have, undoubtedly, been taken into account by management.

 

Both points are valid, however something which has yet to rear its ugly head and that is the fact the the L&BR does have a steam loco in the shed, but as it is owned by a small group it has become an elephant in the room.

Some railways do undertake the repairs of other groups loco in exchange for say an exclusive use of say ten years.

I am not going to open up the can of worms that is the L&BR loco policy, but sufficient to say we lost Bagnall 0-4-2T Issacs due to it and this has left us with just Charles Wytock 4-4-0T, this need s new Boiler and and other bits doing to it I have been told they need to spend something like £110,000 to get her working again.

Now to my way of thinking surely it would be possible to have a deal with CW's owners for say 10 years and the railway to pay for the new Boiler, this way we end up with three working steam locos. I think in the next three to four years both AXE and LYN are due there ten yearly overhauls' so yes an extra fitter will be required to carry out both of those overhauls.

Yes I am aware that two Manning Wardles are in the process of being built, but I can't see either of them being ready in time to cover for both AXE and LYN being out of service. And yes I did offer my services to help but I didn't get a reply.

As for finding a suitable loco to fill the gap, will that one is still ongoing. If anyone has the odd £100,000 down the back of the sofa I am sure the Charlie's Wytock Group would be glad to hear from you.

 

You have no idea whether I understood the nature of the business I worked in, but let's assume I did. The 'practical considerations' you mention that an Accountant contributes - the advice, if you like - and what I was alluding to was Management receiving and absorbing accurate financial statements including management accounts and forecasts towards reasoned decision-making. Just in the same way as Engineering or legal or other aspects of a business. Perhaps I chose a poor example with the Llangollen as it seems their problems started because outside contracts went wrong, but the management was not able to retrieve the situation - lets cite the West Somerset Railway. Wasn't that a case of some people involved not being sufficiently concerned about the need for expenditure to be met by income despite the warnings of the financial director ? If I am wrong you will put me right, and I am not accusing the L & B Management that they are in this category. On the fitter, If it cannot be paid for out of likely income it doesnt matter if it is essential to have one - it cannot be afforded. Numerous jobs are done voluntarily, like the building of LYN for example so that's what would have to be relied upon, or contract labour called in. I would have thought that the sec 73 decision and the effect of the cost of living crisis has everything to do with the future of the railway and whether we ought to be making commitments before these are known.

 

My point is that if the machinery is not maintained there won't be any "likely income" sufficient or insufficient. !

 

I note the comment from @Meatman about the way the ad is framed. However, these will be a lot of information available to the railway management that we can't see, and where it's only reasonable to allow them to make the decisions necessary to keep the railway operating effectively. The SVR and Llangollen are very different operations to the L&B, and we already know that the L&B did well rather than badly in 2022.

What concerns me reading this thread is the sense from some that the future of the L&B is entirely dependent on the success of the extension project as currently defined, and that failure to obtain the S73 will destroy the railway. It feels to me that a doom loop is being created, which risks becoming self-perpetuating - especially as some of the loudest voices are people who have contributed massively to getting the L&B to where it now is.

 

But you do seem to be accusing the L&B of advertising for a fitter that they cannot afford. Have you seen the accounts up to the date the advert was posted? Have you spoken to the GM and asked him for the reasoning behind the appointment?
I think most people would be quite content to accept that the management have done their sums and knows what they are doing, otherwise the railway will get dragged down to nothing because it will constantly be badgered by back-seat managers.

Lyn was built at Alan Keefs under a contract.

 

How does that old saying go 'you find a shilling and you spend 11 and 1/2 pence you are happy, you find a shilling and you spend 12 and 1/2 pence and you are miserable.

35B is right we don't know or have all the information to make the judgment call, but isn't that the crux of the problem here? The membership have been kept out of the information loop as to what is going on.

It is no different as I see it that you have been working hard all week and you get home on the Friday night thinking I made it to the weekend and I have got the bills under control then out of no where you partner comes in and tells you they have just brought a top of the range Land Rover with no consultation with you as to where the money is going to come from just what would be your reaction?

I would be pretty annoyed if that happen to me, but aren't we supposed to be working together as a team? When we do we see results ie a brand new steam loco built in record time (LYN), but something has gone wrong since then or either the Membership have just been taken for granted. I don't know what the answer is.

If we need something then yes lets get it but at least lets see your thinking why we are going down this path, The biggest problems here has been the lack of communications to the membership there also appears to be a major breakdown of Trust between the management and the membership, just how you resolved this well that will be up to the membership to decide at the AGM if they are not happy.

 

I get the point about trust, but this is the wrong way to go about it. It is demanding, and not even just within a closed forum, the right for members to second guess the operational decisions of the railway. This is not about whether you, I or anyone else has been kept out of the loop. It is that the membership appoint the trustees to direct the railway, and they may appoint staff to manage the railway. They need to be allowed to do that, not called in for public scrutiny every time there's a decision that someone is unsure of.

As I've mentioned before, I am a primary school governor. It is emphatically not my job as a governor to get involved in every decision the school leadership makes, but to provide support and challenge about the value of their decisions in terms of what the school is trying to achieve. That may involve supporting (or not) major investments, but I would not be involved in routine recruitment decisions. So, for example, I would be involved in decisions about the budget and how many classes the school has, but not then the appointment of teachers or assistants.

In a preservation society, there is a place for scrutiny, and accountability. It can be informal contact, it can be through the organisation's communication channels (magazine, newsletter, website), and it can ultimately be through the AGM. But this accountability needs to be about how the decisions taken are supporting the objectives of the society, not back seat driving of each decision taken.

 

I'd love to see a crossover analysis of the pseudonyms on here and the names on facebook - it's the same (few) names and pseudonyms over and over again on both - so would we get a venn diagram or a circle?

Will you PLEASE - and this isn't the first time someone's asked you this - stop speaking as though you are the voice of the membership?

You absolutely don't speak for me.

 

What I said was based on that the indications of the cost of living crisis already evident, and likely to be worse after April if the Government subsidy to energy bills is withdrawn and the effect on visitors to North Devon, and therefore the L & B's income might be significant. That will affect affordability.

 

Ultimately it is a balancing act between the requirements of the Operations and the finances. That is the Directors job and not ours to do this. If engineering work needs to be done then you have the alternatives of 1) hiring an appropriately skilled employee or 2) contracting the work out or even 3) not doing the work and finding alternatives (e.g. hiring in). If of course suitable volunteer labour exists and is able and willing then the need for either 1 or 2 may be reduced but not removed. I see that a lot has happened in the last few years - do we have to itemise this? Purchase of trackbed, purchase of The Bungalow, ongoing purchase of the Old Station House, heritage carriages (maintenance and re-creation), all this and running a successful railway... while I appreciate that we all want it to go faster, in reality this was always going to be a slow project, depending as it does on land purchases, finances and planning.

 

Possibly some are, but I would suggest that there are others who have taken off the rose-tinted spectacles and trying to be realistic about what they see.

On the subject of visitors and 'early warning' of Galas etc, I would suggest that it will depend upon whether you are talking about spur-of-the-moment day-trips or pre-planned stays for a couple of days or so. Taking the WSR as an example from my own experience, in the past if I wanted to spend a weekend there then I would work down the list of B&Bs which I used regularly and it would usually only take one or two phone-calls to find a spare room for a Saturday night maybe 2 or 3 weeks ahead. In recent years that as all changed, as many of the B&Bs have closed down altogether and hence the demand increases on the remaining few.

Being a 'tourist area' in West Somerset trying to get a one-night (Saturday) stay is almost impossible - they demand a minimum of 2 nights, some even cite 3, and even if they do have a room that is vacant just for one night they are reluctant to let it 'cos of the costs involved with extra cleaning and laundry etc. (OK, so I'm retired and 'free' to go for 2 or 3 nights if I chose, but then there is the unnecessary extra cost to myself of accommodation and meals). So if I wanted to go a Gala, I would probably have to start booking now just to get in for the Autumn Gala ! I wonder to what extent the situation is similar in North Devon?