The Reader: The Government has no control over our woeful train system

I rely on Thameslink to get to and from work. In the seven years I have lived in my area the service has steadily declined to what now can only be described as shambolic. What should be a 28-minute journey is now taking me from one hour to one hour 40 minutes for the same journey. Trains are cancelled every day. Updates and announcements are extremely poor. People’s patience has worn thin. I’ve witnessed tears, arguments and fights as people struggle to board overflowing trains to just go about their daily business.

The service is an embarrassment, however it is more of an embarrassment for the Government, which seemingly has no ability to gain control of matters. We should not underestimate how people now feel about the appalling train system in this country.

I have contacted Transport Secretary Chris Grayling, but I am sure, like every other passenger, I will just get an automated email from his office. It’s exactly the kind of blank, computer-generated message I am faced with every day on the platform; one that tells me very little of what I need to know, nor makes me feel more optimistic about the situation.

One thing that would help people feel better about this is the Government taking a firmer stand with Govia Thameslink.
Sophie Bray

EDITOR'S REPLY

Dear Sophie

You’RE right — as I found out on a Thameslink train at Horsham the other day which I got on, only for it to be cancelled before it even left. The service is shocking: trips which used to be reliable are often disrupted, like yours. It’s no consolation to hear now that in the end, when this mess is sorted out, there will be more trains to more places with more seats — and running, hopefully, more reliably. So who’s to blame?

The dismaying answer is that there isn’t a single cause — and worse, experienced people at the top of the industry really did ask questions beforehand and convince themselves — and ministers — that it would all work.

When you don’t know why something has gone wrong, it’s a lot harder to put right. The rail industry should be — and is — ashamed of what’s gone on. There are some big questions ahead about reform. Right now, we just need everyone to deliver the service that was promised. They will. But not soon enough.

Julian Glover, Associate Editor (Comment)

Trump's hardline treatment of border children is unacceptable

Donald Trump’s administration has reached a new low, even by his standards. It is now separating the children of immigrants at the Mexican border from their parents, numbering them and detaining them like animals in caged detention camps across the US.

One in seven of these children are aged just four or under. Their parents don’t know where they’ve been taken to and can’t contact them.

Trump is using this barbaric treatment of children as a bargaining counter to free up funds for the construction of his wall at the Mexican border with the US. Footage of distressed and traumatised children weeping for their parents have been dismissed by Trump’s political allies in the media as “crisis acting”.

Given these developments, is Theresa May still planning to welcome Trump on his official visit to the UK on July 13?
Sasha Simic

Don’t just throw money at the NHS

There seems to be a major outcry about the funds that have recently been promised to the NHS by the Government [“Working families ‘will pay for NHS cash boost with £10bn worth of tax hikes’,” June 18] .

The NHS is a bottomless pit and will drain the country, given the chance. The amount of money wasted should be looked into. I’m not saying the problem lies with the doctors and nurses, because they do a good job and could do with a decent pay rise. It is the consultants, among others, who are taking cash which could be better used.

Also, it would help if the Government finally got round to taking money from people who are not resident in the UK before they got any treatment. It is, after all, the National Health Service rather than the World Health Service.
Steve Caldwell

Stop dithering and get on with Brexit

It has now been two years since this country took the momentous step and voted to get out of the clutches of the Brussels bureaucrats.

In those two years, our Prime Minister has done nothing to achieve Brexit, while continuing to send more money and promising to hand over billions to Brussels.

The Foreign Office has spent millions of pounds travelling back and forth and staying in nice hotels. A whole ministry has been set up.

The only way to leave the European Union is to actually leave it — now, with no more money given, no conditions, no debate and no votes in Parliament. Ours or theirs.

Only after we are out of the EU should we even consider trying to negotiate with them. This should get Brexit done and dusted in about a week.
Fred Nicholson

Such hypocrisy over use of drugs

like so many politicians, Lord Hague comes out now over cannabis [“We won’t review case for making cannabis legal, Javid tells Hague,” June 19]. Politicians are shameless: they are the ones who made the laws that outlawed these drugs. I see the issue of assisted dying and suicide in the same light as cannabis.

The Government is intransigent and ludicrous. The pharmaceutical and medical industries have the ear of governments. Until MPs stand up to them we will have to keep fighting to allow very sick people to use drugs such as cannabis — or the right to die with dignity and less suffering.

My husband died at Dignitas last year. He took cannabis that did not have the active ingredient, THC. While this helped, he could have perhaps lived longer without so much pain if he’d had a legal option.
Sara Starkey