TRANSPORT Secretary Jenny Gilruth had boffins up and down the country scratching their chins this week with her latest summary of the situation on Scotland’s newly nationalised railway.

She may even end up as a question on that highbrow quiz show QI where perpetually smug comedians lampoon things with effortless ease that us mere mortals need to Google first.

Ms Gilruth ascertained, without a hint of a smirk, that the rail network is not in chaos.

In fact, she added, it was ‘the opposite of chaos as slashing the timetable to provide a Victorian-era service gave us passengers a degree of certainty.'

Basically, if there are no trains running then none of them can get cancelled at short notice.

I, for one, am extremely grateful for such clarity from our Transport Secretary and I’m sure her colleague with the environment brief won’t mind when I jump in my car to make the same journey.

According to the dictionary definition, chaos is ‘a state of total confusion with no order’.

This, of course, sums up perfectly the current situation on Scotland’s railways as drivers refuse to work extra shifts in a bitter pay dispute.

Hundreds of cancellations resulted from this, leaving passengers pondering whether it was worth taking a punt on the lottery rather than buy a rail ticket as you’ve more chance of scooping the jackpot than actually catching a train.

To combat this, the timetable was slashed by a third and sees very few trains leave after half past 7 to anywhere and has forced thousands of Scots to cancel concerts and nights-out as they can’t get home.

The utter chaos of the nationalised service was highlighted this week when it was pointed out that 52,000 fans were about to descend on Hampden for a crucial World Cup play-off.

Unfortunately, none of the fans, including the Ukranian ones, had a chance at all of getting home after the game as the trains had all stopped.

But, somebody in ScotRail HQ had a rummage around in the back of a sofa and miraculously found a few trains and drivers to ensure some folk, at least, could get home.

This was just 24 hours before kick-off and perhaps is the very definition of chaos, rather than the opposite.

What is even more embarrassing to the country is the fact that the Ukranian rail network is continuing to run despite the Russian invasion.

Ukrzaliznytsia has become a symbol of the resistance and is transporting weapons from the west and hundreds of thousands of ordinary Ukranians around the country.

Quite what the Ukranian fans thought of our rail network shutting down at half past 7 at night is anyone’s guess.

The chaos has carried on with the train drivers' union Aslef rejecting a new and ‘final’ offer of a 4.2% pay rise.

Only they didn’t even bother to ask their members – they just rejected it.

Now there are moves to reopen talks between ScotRail and Aslef –only it couldn’t be yesterday or today because no-one from the rail firm was available due to the jubilee public holiday.

This breathtaking arrogance and complacency from all sides of the dispute makes us a laughing stock but it really isn’t funny for us, the travelling public.

We fund the railways through our tax and tickets and we actually expect very little in return.

Basically, all we want is a train. With a driver. It’s not too much to expect is it?

Instead we get utter chaos and weasel words while being increasingly stuck in traffic jams.

The blame for this utter shambles lies at the door of all concerned, but ministers have to shoulder most of the responsibility.

It was them that nationalised the network but did nothing to ensure it was good to go. There were no fact-finding missions to other countries to see how their nationalised networks worked.

Nor was there any attempt to address the driver shortages that helped Abellio lose the franchise in the first place.

In short, it appears that not a jot was done to ensure the service was going to be a success. But at least we have a Transport Secretary at the helm that will ensure the service will run as smoothly as a German express train.

When asked in Holyrood to identify what was being done to improve things, she said: “I’m not here today to inform the member of additional services that Scotland will be running because ScotRail is the train operator. I am the Transport Minister. I don’t drive the trains.” We should all be thankful for that at least.