Channel 5 series - Paddington Station 24/7, starting 11 September 2017

[whole diary]

[TonyK]

Or there was more to her problems than what were shown?
There was clearly the start of the conversation missing, as the lady said she has been told one thing and then told another

In my experience in public service over four decades, some people listen to half of what is said, then complain about the other half.

[ellendune]

GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) do what DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) put in the contract.  It was a negotiated contract so like as not DfT complied with modern procurement practice and got a price then told them they had to cut it.  That is because procurement practice demands that each re-let of a contract is less than the last (that is why some many outsourcing companies are in financial trouble). Control in Swindon is therefore likely to be understaffed on any day when something is actually going wrong. They will therefore find it impossible to communicate effectively. 

The practice states that the person letting the contract does not have to find a way for the contractor to make the saving that is for the contractor to find 'efficiency savings'. Once a contract has been let a few times then, barring some major new technological advance, there are no such efficiency savings to be had. They can't cut safety so staff in other roles are forced to work harder. What is worse when working under such pressures there is no time to come up with any genuine efficiency savings.

The result of this is that staff morale plummets, people leave and those left behind have a heavier burden.  When staff are working under such pressures being nice to customers takes much more effort, particularly when customers are angry because the service is so bad.

So if we want better customer service then just like anything else it must be paid for. This mirrors what is going on all over the country in both public and private sectors.

So why should we expect GWR care about customer service when their client (DfT or Treasury) does not? The treasury after all is only interested in money and seeks to rule all of government.

[TaplowGreen]

So why should we expect GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) care about customer service when their client (DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) or Treasury) does not?

Two words. Organisational culture.

[ChrisB]

I hope the above features in the report Grayling has just ordered from this John Lewis guy frankly....

[TonyK]

I hope the above features in the report Grayling has just ordered from this John Lewis guy frankly....

I wonder. I just signed up with them as part of my BTexit strategy, and I got a £40 voucher. Does Grayling have to declare it if he gets one with the inquiry?

[Phantom]

Just watched last night's episode back and noticed something a bit odd, at Paddington everytime there is a station clock on screen it's pixilated out, any idea why this is?
But the other odd thing for some situations they put a clock graphic on the screen showing the time...

[broadgage]

Just watched last night's episode back and noticed something a bit odd, at Paddington everytime there is a station clock on screen it's pixilated out, any idea why this is?
But the other odd thing for some situations they put a clock graphic on the screen showing the time...

I suspect that it might be automatic, by the same software that pixelates out car number plates.

[didcotdean]

If it is automatic, it doesn't work on clocks with hands, as there is one visible often in scenes in Control.

Maybe some things are shown a bit out of sequence.

[broadgage]

An automatic feature intended to pixelate car number plates would probably react to digital clock displays, but not to traditional clocks.

A similar effect may be observed in Google street view where the letters and numbers in road signs or advertisements are sometimes obscured.

[Phantom]

I would bet money that if they were not there already the TV crew would have dashed down there this morning (if not last night), they will have plenty of footage of chaos to show

[Timmer]

I would bet money that if they were not there already the TV crew would have dashed down there this morning (if not last night), they will have plenty of footage of chaos to show

They can easily make a story out of it using archive footage which is what they mainly do. Just show a packed then empty Paddington, control in Swindon, workers on the line etc and some angry passengers and there's your story from what happened last night/today. Easy. Makes you wonder if it was a good idea to let Channel 5 make a series of the woes of the GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line) even though at times it has been educational to help people understand what happens when things go wrong.

[Sixty3Closure]

Just watched last night's episode back and noticed something a bit odd, at Paddington everytime there is a station clock on screen it's pixilated out, any idea why this is?
But the other odd thing for some situations they put a clock graphic on the screen showing the time...

It depends which editing software they used. Some like FCP you have to manually track what you're blurring as they move across the shot but other like Adobe After Effects tracks it for you. You'd normally have to identify what you want to track though as having the software go through and pixelate any numbers could have unintended consequences. Might be a genuine reason such as they used library footage and the time would show it was edited out of sequence or someone was just a bit keen with the software options.

[patch38]

It's simply the way the programme (like every TV programme) is edited. The primary footage tells the story but to make it flow and to help explain the story to the viewer various other content is edited in. Establishing shots (that locate and establish the nature of the story) may be filmed at a different time, often on a different day - a sunnier one maybe. If the main story is filmed on a single camera, cut-away shots are inserted to avoid awkward cuts and edits. In current affairs programmes these are known as 'noddies' because they often feaure the interviewer nodding in agreement to camera while the edit point passes. B-roll footage is also added to pad out the story. It too may be shot at a different time or day sometimes on smaller cameras (and nowadays drones) and often without an audio track. Or it may come from library footage or archives: compare episodes of Paddington 24/7 and count how often the same shot of an HST^▸ (High Speed Train) departing crops up in different stories.

Anyway... the point of the above is to illustrate what a pain in the a*se live clocks are for the video editor: the main story takes place at 14:05 to 15:00 but all the B-roll footage we have has clocks showing 10:30 and 17:50! Hence the pixellation or the insertion of an on-screen clock to re-establish the 'real' time line.

It's always interesting to lift the curtain to see how it all works - sorry if I have spoilt it for you 

[Rob on the hill]

There's a Christmas edition tonight at 8pm, 27th December 2018. Guessing it will feature goings-on from Christmas 2017.