?CrossCountry trains have been in a process of ripping out the cafés from their trains and replacing them with a trolley service. I have tried both the tea and coffee from this new format and can say that they are starting to return to the fine standards of British Rail. I shall not be buying any more cups of brown from them. I have to say that I very rarely see any of the regulars buying any more now either.

I have never liked the idea that cutting costs as a way to improve a business. Companies have a duty to make a profit for their shareholders and assuming that the government subsidy is not going to cover the dividend then customers are seen as a "revenue stream" rather than an asset to be looked after. Spending money on improving the service will mean people are more likely to take the train and so profits will go up. Don't cut services till you have made too unpleasent to attract anybody but fix the problems that you already have. Provide trains with enough seats for everybody and some room to fit your legs in. Fix doors so that they don't close on people as they try to go through. Fix your seat reservation system so that is not always crashing and people don't have to wait at each seat. Make your high speed trains run at high speeds.

Competition should take care of this and send bad companies to the wall and let the good ones thrive but we don't have competition on the railways. With only one company covering many of the routes and the government covering any losses a bad company is making then the only competition comes from stretching out the timetables to make sure all the trains run on time, if a little slow, and make sure that you meet your targets.

Sorry for another boring train rant.