Rail report’s content

Press, 4 February 1984, Page 13

Rail report’s content

PA Auckland Railwaymen say that the Wellington “grapevine” has told them virtually everything contained in the confidential Booz-Allen railway report. Since the report was finished in November railway unions have been asking for a copy. So far the Railways Corporation has refused. But the general secretary of the National Union of Railwaymen, Mr Don Goodfellow, said secrets could not be kept. “Nothing is sacred in Wellington. It is like a sieve,” he said. “You can just about go down to De Bretts bar and find out what the Prime Minister is thinking.” One snippet picked up from a Ministry of Transport executive was that the report recommended a 40 per cent cut in staff at railway workshops.

The report did not want to end passenger rail services. They should be kept going with a Government subsidy. Apart from misgivings over electrification of the North Island Main Trunk line, the report said “exactly what the corporation wanted to hear,” said Mr Goodfellow. Efforts to gain a copy of the report would not stop. “We know what is in the report. We just want to see it officially,” he said. The chairman of the corporation, Mr Lindsay Papps, was not available to confirm or deny the union’s claims.