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For the 2017 elections, the Labour Party proposes:

Bring private rail companies back into public ownership as their franchises expire.

Eurostar is not subject to franchising, and the UK government sold its 40% ownership share in the parent company. Does the Labour Party propose to bring this share back into public ownership?

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The Eurostar ownership is not subject to franchising, and there is no proposal to repurchase the shares in Eurostar that were sold. There is no public policy in the Labour Party to re-nationalise any part of Eurostar.

This could change, particularly if Eurostar were to start having significant financial problems. Or if the quality of service were to drop below acceptable standards. However, there are only 10% of shares that are held by a UK stockholder. While the government could legislate to compel Hermes Infrastructure to sell back its shares, there is nothing it could do to require CDPQ to do so, as they are a Canadian company. A government could make an offer to buy the shares, but this would require them to pay over the odds. It would be very costly. Nationalisation in a globalised economy is hard to do.

As noted by Royal Canadian Bandit, Eurostar's rolling stock and other assets are located in the UK and subject to UK law. If it so wished, the UK government could expropriate them and give the owners whatever compensation it saw fit. The wider consequences for investment in the UK would be severe, so even a Corbyn-led Labour government is unlikely to do this

So unlike the regional rail companies, there is little chance of Eurostar being re-nationalised.

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    Eurostar's rolling stock and other assets are located in the UK and subject to UK law. If it so wished, the UK government could expropriate them and give the owners whatever compensation it saw fit. The wider consequences for investment in the UK would be severe, so even a Corbyn-led Labour government is unlikely to do this, but in principle it can be done. – Royal Canadian Bandit Jul 17 '17 at 8:21
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    That's true, a sovereign country can do whatever it wants. But you are quite right to say that this would have severe consequences for investment. I'll edit to incorporate your comment. – James K Jul 17 '17 at 16:19
  • @royal Canadian bandit: Sure, it would have an impact on investment, but if forewarned then the effects can be mitigated to some extent. – Mozibur Ullah Aug 14 '17 at 21:13
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The Channel Tunnel concession operated by Eurostar is established by British-French Treaty. By international law, parties can withdraw from treaties in a manner specified in that treaty. But only if a treaty does not specify a means of withdrawal can a party withdraw by giving the other parties notice of its intent to withdraw. There are no infinite treaties.

In this case, the French-British treaty does have a clear exit: the concession runs to a specific end date (2086, 100 years after signing). It would be a bit speculative to assume the Labor party will still be around by then, and Mr. Corbyn in particular. And even if the party survives, their policies are likely to have changed.

Note that this is a bilateral treaty, not affected by the Brexit.

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