Alison Munro
the specification of the design and how it will operate, that we’re drawing all of the lessons of tried and tested systems. But also learning from other countries in terms of how to make sure the benefits are realised, because one of the things we observe is that high speed rail provides an opportunity, it doesn’t necessarily deliver the silver bullet on its own, and places that have been successful in using high speed rail to regenerate and to lead development have had strong supporting policies to ensure those benefits are realised.’
Getting asset management
to get out to meet the businesses in the cities because we need to hear what the benefits are for them so we can make sure we design HS2 in a way that maximises opportunities.’
A year into his role as head of the ORR, Richard Price tells Katie Silvester how Network Rail is progressing with its efficiency improvements
Keeping a balance With the Queen’s speech giving emphatic approval to HS2 with not one but two bills - a hybrid measure giving government power to build the first phase, and a paving bill to allow preparatory department spending, the project is pretty much a goer. But the path is far from clear. The government is due to finalise the precise route of HS2 next year in advance of legislation in 2015 - but that is likely to be delayed by a flood of judicial reviews and court actions over the legality of the consultation process, among many other predicted future issues. Media commentary, while conveying that the project enjoys cross-party support, has mostly concentrated on the negatives. Perhaps not surprisingly, The Telegraph of 7th May ran a piece on its own research which concluded that HS2 will ‘destroy more jobs than it creates’; respected rail commentator Christian Wolmar suggested the environmental and economic case for HS2 is ‘losing clout’ and former Wales secretary Cheryl Gillian labelled the project a ‘boy’s toy’ that will ‘saddle future governments with huge debt.’
T
he Office of Rail Regulation (ORR) is in the middle of one of the busiest periods in Network Rail’s funding cycle, which it oversees. The government has just announced its High Level Output Specification (HLOS) for Control Period 5 (2014 to 2019), which sets out what rail projects will be funded (see page 17). The ORR acts as a go-between for the DfT and Network Rail, scrutinising Network Rail’s plans and financial reckoning on behalf of the department. To put it in a nutshell, the DfT says what it wants
from Network Rail and the funds that are available. Network Rail comes back and says: ‘We can’t do all this for that amount of money.’ And the ORR negotiates with Network Rail about which bits can be done more cheaply, or delayed, until an agreement is reached about exactly what will go ahead for what cost. At the same time, there is constant pressure on Network Rail to improve its efficiency and reduce its costs.
How does Munro feel about all this on a personal level - it can’t be easy to deal with? Again, she is steadfast after a fairly long pause. ‘One has to seek a balance here. This is a fantastic project and will be the biggest in Europe, so you have to keep in mind the reasons why we’re doing it. That said, obviously there are a lot of people along the route who understandably are very upset by the proposals and worried about what it will mean for them. And we have to deal with those as sensitively and respectfully as we can. But at the end of the day this is a great legacy for the country.’ So you’re happy and strong each day to defend it? I ask. ‘Yes, as I say it can be difficult at times, it can be difficult for me and difficult for my staff because they do get into some really quite upsetting and emotional conversations with people, but I think generally there is a positive feeling here because we see it as a great project to be working on.’
year, so this is the first HLOS he has worked on. Network Rail’s job is really only about one thing, reckons Price – asset management. ‘I think Network Rail has achieved a lot over the
The job is clearly something that Munro enjoys doing, ‘It’s a privilege to be working on something that will be a real game changer and we have a really good organisation here, with an incredibly positive attitude, a really broad mix of skills and backgrounds, really pulling together.’ She also enjoys ‘working with the cities’ that will be connected by HS2. ‘There’s a lot to deliver so I have to make sure it all gets done, but I try
CEO Richard Price has been in post for just a
right is the key to unlocking everything else : efficiency, performance, capacity and safety
Come to my dinner party
last decade. It really bears repeating that its costs have already come down over the past 10 years by 40 per cent and it has achieved levels of punctuality across the system. Customer satisfaction is close to record levels and it’s had a transformation in that period and that’s something that it should be proud of.
Munro started her career as an economist in
‘But there are still huge challenges. Its costs are still too high by any measure. It’s got big challenges in delivering the commitments that it made in the last periodic review, most obviously around punctuality. And it’s got a lot of work to do in ensuring that it really understands its asset base and has world-class management practices. Getting asset management right is the key to unlocking everything else: efficiency, performance, capacity and safety.’ But Price says he is impressed with the approach Network Rail’s new CEO David Higgins is taking to asset management.
the environmental sphere, joining what was then the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions. Later she became more of a generalist and began focusing on transport, ‘I think because transport economics is actually a really interesting and very well-developed area where there’s a lot of work for economists to do. But also transport affects everybody’s lives so it’s actually something that’s very topical, and it’s a great dinner party conversation, in fact I can’t go to a dinner party and say I work in transport without someone complaining about their parking ticket or something like that.’
Women in rail
A big part of Price’s job is to drive Network Rail’s efficiency targets. Various studies have found that the infrastructure owner’s European counterparts are usually able to run their operations more cheaply than Network Rail – and a key part of the McNulty value-for-money study focused on finding ways >
Having come that morning from Railtex, where I was struck by the absolute paucity of women, I realised more than ever that new initiatives such as the networking and mentoring group, Women in Rail, are absolutely vital. Munro agrees. ‘I think progress is being made but you’re definitely right, women are in a minority in the rail sector. I have to say when I worked in the
Google Alison Munro and a list of business-like information will dominate - there is very little information about her on a personal level. She is happy to be open but slightly taken by surprise and one gets the sense that through all this, there haven’t been many questions along the lines of ‘how do you relax in your spare time?’. In fact she plays tennis ‘when I can’, and likes reading, again when she can. ‘I also like to have time with my family - I’ve got two grown up daughters but it’s nice to see them at the weekends, and I like cooking and I like wine.’
Objectors in a ‘different place’ Pondering the not so enjoyable side and asked what worries her most, Munro takes a while, and she is circumspect but honest. ‘I think it is getting our communications right. We have tried very, very hard with people along the route but there are quite a lot who are still really trying to challenge whether the project should go ahead. We are trying to really engage with them in terms of ‘how do we refine the design of the project’, but they’re not really in the same place, they’re still in a place where they don’t want it to happen. We haven’t got it all right first time, so I think that’s probably the most difficult and challenging area.
‘The other thing is to make sure that we are also concentrating on the positives. It can be easy to be drawn into worrying all the time about how we manage the people along the route and their concerns, which obviously is very important, but we also need to make sure we’re keeping our eye on the beneficiaries as well and making sure that we’re addressing and communicating the opportunities that we can give them.’
June 2013 Page 31
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