More Foreign Control?

The sale of the first of the Bus Barons’ empires to Deutsche Bahn may set the scene for a new chapter in the history of the UK bus and transport industries. According to the Telegraph, more may follow.

It reports the rumour that following the failure of the Arriva/SNCF proposal, SNCF may seek a consolation. In January 2010, French state-backed SNCF held talks with Arriva over a potential merger with Keolis, jointly owned by SNCF. Those talks eventually broke down, allowing Germany's Deutsche Bahn to launch its £1.6bn Arriva bid.

Perhaps there’s no surprise that National Express is now said to be the most likely SNCF target, especially as the Cosmen family, the company's largest shareholder, is believed to be a willing seller. The relationship between the Cosmens and the NatEx board has been strained.
But there’s more. The group that likes to present and promote an independent face is also thought to be within the target of SCNF. That’s Go Ahead, in case you hadn’t guessed.

There are all sorts of jokes floating around about disgruntled Arriva passengers having now to write to German president Angela Merkel or Arriva bus drivers being German civil servants. There are some serious issues, though. Will foreign owners without experience of our free market regime prefer doing business the European way? Will they side with the likes of the P.T.E.G, the passenger transport executive group, in calling for re-regulation via franchises? Will such calls continue to fall on deaf Conservative ears? And at a time when the Cameron/Clegg administration wants to roll back the state, could we see further state control of our strategic transport operators, albeit not by our own government?

It’s probably stretching the imagination too far to speculate but what if SNCF took over Go Ahead and later began co-operating more or even merged with Parisian RATP, soon to be owners of Transdev Yellow Buses. Would this result in the two large Dorset players under if not common management then a collaborative one? Now *that* would be interesting… who knows what deals are yet to be done.