CPA Bulletin

44 CPA Bulletin > November 2024 www.cpa.uk.net It is now a couple of months since Labour took over the government of the country. I thought it was worth reflecting on what this might mean for the railway in general and for the plant community in particular. The new government did not hang about in terms of its agenda for railways, introducing the Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Bill within its first month in office. This means that, as franchises end, the train operating companies will be progressively nationalised and form part of Great British Railways. I think that the various franchises have done a great job over the last 30 years in terms of improving the quality of service and increasing passenger numbers. But you reach a point of diminishing returns and renationalising the train operating companies offers a one off opportunity for efficiency savings which can hopefully then be spent on improving the railway infrastructure. The removal of management fees, the disbanding of the delay attribution armies and the merging of common support organisations such as safety, finance, payroll, IT, communications, etc should Steve Featherstone RPA Consultant rail plant association RAIL PLANT ASSOCIATION: 1 In the last edition of the magazine, RPA chair Paul Helks stood down and it a pleasure and honour to take over from Paul. On 4th September, I chaired the 192nd Management Committee meeting in Stafford to start my duties, which was well attended with vigorous discussions on a range of topics. There were a couple of key areas that are of note. The first concerns ALO planners and Coordinators on when they have to hold the Sentinel OTP 04 Control of Any Line Open competence, which was communicated to the industry as the 10th February 2025. In the latest issue of module P500 of the Infrastructure Plant Manual, which comes into force on the 7th of December it states: ‘All persons planning and coordinating ALO operations on NRMI and Network Rail projects shall be trained and assessed in accordance with the Sentinel Scheme Control of ALO competence.’ The Network Technical Head of Plant for Network Rail confirmed that the complying with the 10th February 2025 date i.e. complying with the Sentinel scheme requirements means compliance to the Infrastructure Plant Manual. All sponsors should be managing the transition from bespoke courses to the Sentinel course before that date for anyone who plans and controls ALO operations. Another subject discussed was the position with OTP coremodule. I had two calls on this subject fromRPAmembers who had had their staff turned away from sites as the date for OTP core had expired on their Sentinel smart card. The OTP Core module was removed from the Sentinel competency framework at the end of 2023 and is now simply an e-Learning package and all who have gone through this e-learning will have been issued with a certificate to demonstrate this which should be taken to site as proof of completion. Delivery Point Management (DPM) is a key subject to our members, and the RPA is aware of several working groups in different Network Rail regions being established and developing processes, which is positive to hear. However, concern was raised that the process developed may differ in content across the routes and regions and for national suppliers this could cause confusion as to what process to follow. It would be beneficial if the leads of each working group shared their work and develop one core process, maybe with local additions at the end. The RPA Management Committee offers its support to the working group leads to help develop a robust DPM process. Over the last 10 years there has been several collisions between OTP and following the Ramsden Bellhouse collision, a lot of work has been carried out on the RAIB report recommendations by the Mechanical & Electrical Engineers Networking Group (M&EE NG), RSSB and the RPA. As part of the analysis of these events, the competence of the operator when driving the plant including down steep gradients was an area identified that improvements could be made. A working group was established between the M&EE NG and RPA and good progress has been made to develop an OTP Operator Professional Driving Guidance to provide sponsors, trainers and assessors with a robust process to cover this important element of an operator’s duties. Equally there will be a lot of guidance for an operator on driving techniques which it is hoped will form an essential and useful source of information for them. Andy Crago RPA Management Committee Chair