The government is completing the nationalisation of British Rail. It thinks it was much better before privatisation on 1 January 1997 after 49 years of full public ownership.
Over that half century there was a big decline in rail use. 996 m passenger journeys in 1948 had fallen to 628 min 1997. It was bad news for employees of the state concern . 500,000 of the 650,000 original jobs disappeared as freight and passengers diverted to the roads. That was an average loss of 10,000 jobs a year. That was not what the Unions and Ministers had in mind when they borrowed £1132 m to acquire the assets.That would be £47,000 m in todays money. All added to the state debt.
The nationalised railway went through phases of closures, accelerated in the Beeching notorious termination of many small lines and heavily loss making services. It failed to open new branch and spur lines to keep up with changing patterns of demand. It watched as Heathrow became one of the world’s busiest airports but failed to put in a 5 mile spur line to link the airport to the mainline network. It took BAA to do that as a private project, linking to Railtrack lines after privatisation. BR watched as many new large industrial estates opened near motorways with no thought to offer a branch line for freight shipment.
Between 1973 and 1978 30 people died in bad rail crashes and a fire. In contrast for the 14 years of Conservative government and partial privatisation 2010-24 there were just 3 deaths. Both the nationalised and privatised industry have had some serious crashes. Nationalisation was not safer.
The losses of the nationalised industry were large. Fares usually went up by more than inflation, with taxpayer subsidy paying far more of the costs than fare revenue.
July 30, 2026
Socialism eschews reality. It does not recognise it. Socialism has always been and will always remain a dream. in practice it is universally a fialure economically and causes oppression and poverty. But this time it will be different because its failures are always the fault of the filthy capitalists who just won’t submit. Why won’t they submit? Oh, because they are normal human beings and that is the root of the problem.
July 30, 2026
@Peter Gardner – Socialism as with so-called WOKE trends, so-called HR all have as their core base discrimination. They set out to create a them and us, the entitled and the minion. Well meaning platitudes based on type casting everything in their own personal image. As long as you accept my personal direction and fit my personal views you can be ruled by me.
July 30, 2026
Socialism simply does not understand human nature or scientific or economic realities.
If rail and road had a level playing field in tax and subsidy terms the relative cost of trains would be more like 8 times higher rather than circa two times as now. That is also for a car with a single person – with a full car and end trips included over 40 times cheaper. So what would the real demand for trains then be at those prices. The people who cannot drive who have to use trains and buses will some be catered for by far cheaper and driverless door to door taxis.
Perhaps we would need another Dr Beaching and we certainly will need more road capacity to widen congested roads.
July 30, 2026
Sadly not many politicians seem to understand Hunan Nature at all, given the policies they have put forward over the years.
July 30, 2026
But the government is and has for years been very active in reducing road space with new bus and bike lanes, environmental areas, anti-car traffic lights, mad new road junction designs and one way systems…
July 30, 2026
Large capital investment by BR in the 1980’s had to be signed off by the Government. As regards Heathrow the Piccadilly Line had not long reached the airport and was deemed to be a great success.
BR in it’s pre privatised state was also a great success and will be incomparable to the Labour chaos to follow, which in itself is the natural successor to the doomed Tory rail privatisation of 1994. Ahead of Blair the Conservatives were desperate to be rid of the railways.. it was handled very badly and has sown the seeds for the terrible service we endure today.
July 30, 2026
‘ It thinks it was much better before privatisation on 1 January 1997 after 49 years of full public ownership.’
It was.
We had a joined-up national rail service with affordable fares. You did not need to check before a journey in case your train was cancelled or delayed.
Privatisation gave us a dogs breakfast. It was no longer a single entity. All sorts of poorly run franchises came and went. The maintenance of the infrastructure had to be renationalised because of serious safety concerns. Government then started making it up as they went along once they realised what a terrible mistake they had made – the era of people like ‘failing Grayling’ and others.
July 30, 2026
The government foolishly believed it was a return to the days of God’s Wonderful Railway. However, that was built up from scratch and the company owned the whole lot – stations, tracks, infrastucture. It had dynamic business people and great engineers at the helm with a can-do attitude.
The whole lot was too expensive to attract a single buyer. Hence franchises.
Franchises were not looking at investment, or the long term. Subsidies were attractive. Foreign rail companies could use profits to subsidise their business at home. Passengers or ‘customers’ were a secondary consideration, as was the service.
If it did not suit the franchise pulled out, as in Wales and elsewhere. There were disincentives to add rolling stock. Weekend services were cheaper with replacement buses. Engineering works were a useful cover story. Complaints departments expanded. New excuses were dreamed up. As mentioned elsewhere in the comments, pride in the job of a railwayman gradually disappeared.
Reply The nationalised industry got rid of three quarters of its workforce 1949-97. Industrial relations were bad, with plenty of strikes. Services were poor, subject delays and cancellations.
July 30, 2026
‘Services were poor, subject delays and cancellations.‘
My experiences include daily schoolboy travel to a station with the worst rail accident in British peacetime history( before my time) and regular commuting into The City for decades.
My experience is that the nationalised service was far better than the privatised one. More frequent trains, later departure of the last train from Waterloo
Starting off in the days of ‘Ladies Only’ carriages. Heavy smoking in all carriages apart from a few ‘non smoking’ ones. Slam door trains.
You could also get a good breakfast if you had to get an early train on business. Nowadays it’s a sad trolley pushed through the train and frequent apologies for the inability to provide hot drinks.
As Arthur Daley memorably informed Terry McCann on a trip after the demise of the Brighton Belle –
“ You wouldn’t catch Gielgud sitting there shoving an individual fruit pie into his north and south.”
July 30, 2026
worse than that the staff were simply rude, and openly gave the wrong information. I remember watching a customer service advisor working for the nationalised British rail tell a passenger the completely incorrect trains to get on to their destination, and smirking about it as the passenger left. no service ethos at all.
July 30, 2026
So did you pass on the correct information to the traveller?
July 30, 2026
it was too busy. it was Birmingham New St
July 30, 2026
Good morning.
The fall in both public and freight use of our railways marks both the change in society as the car took over, and the demise of British industry and manufacturing. Rail use will further undergo losses as people can no longer afford the high prices and the ability for some to work from home.
There needs to be a serious look at railways and their future use as society changes. Nationalisation or privatisation is not going to do that each on their own. It requires a joint effort.
Reply The main reason for freight collapse was nationalised Rail insistence on trainloads only.
July 30, 2026
Freight by trains in the small UK is rarely practical in the smallish UK, nor cost efficient compared to far more flexible trucks. This largely due to the two truck/van end connections usually need. Once on a truck or van it might as well go all the way and so avoid all the extra loading and unloading.
July 30, 2026
Reply to reply:
Rail freight began its demise when goods at either end were no longer transported to their final destination by horse and cart. It was the lorry which could transport goods door-to-door which killed rail freight except for very large, very specific loads like moving coal to power stations.
July 30, 2026
Remember the RED STAR parcel system, with a guarantee of next day delivery.
Rail may just about be value for money for one person on long distance, but only if the train Stations are near to your start and stop destinations, it is an extremely expensive way to travel for families and groups as the car wins every time for convenience and cost, even with expensive car parking charges included, which may also apply at train stations (if they exist at all)
July 30, 2026
Yes, I remember the RED STAR parcel system back in the 1980s. £100+ to send a suitcase of samples which needed to be taken and collected from a mainline station
July 31, 2026
OR
Do not remember it being that expensive, but yes it was delivery and collection from the Station, and for long distances to get desperately needed goods/supplies some distance in a hurry, when other means of transport weren’t available, it served a cause, but certainly would not have been used otherwise.
July 30, 2026
Query on reply
To be clear, does that mean that companies could not pay for a single truckload on capacity on a train? They must pay for the whole train?
If so that is a Kodak-like approach to businesss
Reply, Yes . Rail would only haul a trainload, not pick up a single waggon.
July 30, 2026
The British government is re-nationalising the passenger rail network under the Passenger Railway Services (Public Ownership) Act 2024 to eliminate extreme fragmentation, reduce waste, and create a single unified system. By waiting for private contracts to expire, the state is systematically absorbing operators without paying costly buyout fees. This will eventually culminate in a state-owned overarching body known as Great British Railways (GBR)
When the network was privatised in the mid-1990s, it was split into more than 100 separate pieces. This structure caused three critical failures:-
1) Splitting physical infrastructure (tracks/signalling) from rolling stock destroyed operational harmony. Separate private companies prioritised suing one another over delay attributions, rather than fixing underlying system failures, while a mix of competing entities led to confusing and expensive ticket pricing
2) The initial private track monopoly, Railtrack, prioritised short-term shareholder payouts over safety and maintenance. Severe backlogs led to fatal derailments – such as the Hatfield crash in 2000 – forcing the government to rescue the tracks under the public body Network Rail
3) Private operators were heavily reliant on massive taxpayer subsidies to appear profitable. The franchising model allowed private corporations to pocket profits when demand was high, but routinely default or walk away from their contracts when financial targets were missed, forcing the state to step in as the operator of last resort
Merging tracks and trains under GBR aims to deliver simplified and cheaper ticketing, reliable timetables, and unified public accountability. Time will tell.
Reply As I have pointed out the safety record of nationalised BR in the 1970 s was very poor. Semi privatised rail 2010-24 was much safer.
The privatisation model of monopoly track and segregation of trains was a bad one which I opposed within government. It is the monopoly that does the damage, so increasing the strength of the monopoly through full nationalisation will make things worse. We need choice and contestability to get more Hull trains solutions.
July 30, 2026
Sakara Gold
1, 2 and 3 – Correct.
July 30, 2026
The JR reply is surely correct.
July 30, 2026
The UK Parliament and it is the UK Parliament keeps jumping in on well meaning knee-jerk responses on things that the majority doesn’t have the experience, ability and the wherewithal to even comprehend the basic mechanics of business. The majority of them cant even run themselves they are totally out of their own personal depth.
The members of the UK Parliament consistently and constantly keep banging out the same old personal ideological mantra of how things are done to get elected. That the point, it is not what is best for the country and the people they need to vote for them, but what will get them elected, its me, me, me.
What might have started out as well meaning on the back of service to the people and the country many eon’s ago has now got so distorted and warped that the very processes and purpose of the UK Parliament has little to do with the Countries well being, democracy. It has become a ‘den’ of self gratification at the nations expense
July 30, 2026
There was a time when being a railwayman was a badge of honour. Not now I suspect. We designed and built our own rolling stock. Much of what is done now is designed abroad and we put the stock together using imported kit.
July 30, 2026
M,
Yes, I have met them. Mostly retired or sadly deceased now – drivers, signalmen plus one Tube driver still working. Often they are very enthusiastic about all forms of transport. Though some can bore you to death with detail in which you are not interested. The Tube does not have the same esprit de corps but the Tube man is a decent chap. He has experienced jumpers too, but does not talk about it.
July 30, 2026
As with all things that hit the privatisation trail they were conceived by poor assumptions. The UK Parliament, its Government wanted to relieve the burden of the taxpayer constantly paying and therefore the State having to be more creative in its tax.
As the UK Parliament and Government is so wound up with self and the next election, they also don’t understand the meaning and concept of a business a profitable business and the market place.
Their nationalisation killed one industry after another, rail, auto, shipbuilding, aircraft building all taken on for ‘personal’ glory and ‘ego’ all failed because the lack of ability, understanding and appreciation of what was required to manage a business. Just look at the ‘tribes’ in Parliament they can barely manage themselves.
They employed the same desperate management skills when the offloaded this once great industries, their(Parliaments) lack of experience and understanding meant they chucked these industries out without a consideration for the industries purpose and its workforce.
Industries/businesses exist as the result of the market place, active competition. Parliament was so concerned of just getting ‘shot’ they handed these great industries and businesses over not to improve and evolve the offering just to get ‘shot’. No planning, no thought, just get ‘shot’ the same acumen and management skills employed by them causing the failures in the first place. All these entities that the State divested its self from went on to cost the taxpayer, and kept costing the taxpayer.
All companies that get sold of in this way fail. Yet the majority of companies that are returned to those that built them the ‘work-force’ go on an thrive. If the Taxpayer money the UK Parliament has wasted funding foreign companies to asset strip and remove a competitor of theirs from the market place, was used as a bank to support a worker buyout we would have healthy private UK industries.
Parliament should keep well away from things they can’t demonstrate a capability, experience, nohow on how to manage
July 30, 2026
Nationalised industries don’t understand price elasticity and marginal costs
July 30, 2026
To illustrate the capability of the UK Parliament and why they can’t be trusted to manage things and why I favour the management/worker buyout style for returning things to the private sector. Getting those with a vested interest to control their future
After WW2 the USA came up with the ‘Marshal Plan’ to help build a war-torn Europe in today’s money that would have been $137 billion. Germany got $15billion the UK around $35billion
Germany kept investing, earning and reinvesting so that same fund today stands at approx $619. billion, with a total equity value of $45 billion. Still there, still growing and funding the Countries future
The UK’s Socialist (Labour) Government back then in parlance of the day ‘spaffed-it-all-up-the-wall’ got ‘shot off’ just to get elected, the me, me, me trait that remains today just more so. No investment, no return just personal ego to the fore, no future just me at the next election. A Parliament not fit for purpose.
That is the same attitude employed in both nationalising and privatising of things and inept Parliament has no skills in. Their only preoccupation is ‘self’ not the countries or its peoples future
July 30, 2026
Whether private or public, the main criterion for any rail service is that it is run properly.
It is not.
July 30, 2026
Indeed anything needs to be run well and serve the voters needs.
Indeed is anything much run or even just regulated by government in the UK run well for the population? Rail, Water, Energy, Schools, Universities, student loans, prisons, the two tier DEI policing and justice, social services, the roads, the bus systems, the planning system, local authorities, the NHS…
July 30, 2026
Yesterday we read that there should be private investment in roads. Why during rails private ownership were no branch lines built. Because there is no return on the investment I feel.
The decline in passengers you state had as much to do with the advent of car ownership as the service.
The fact is that railways are essential but need subsidy. This is either paid to private companies who pay their shareholders (which is not a good look) or nationalised. All other countries subsidise heavily
Reply Private capital built the link line to Heathrow where there were plenty if passengers waiting. Not enough train slots on the nationalised track to make it worthwhile to offer branch lines into large industrial parks.
July 30, 2026
Reply to reply
Rural areas can’t even get broadband to the door. I can’t see private capital building rail lines.
The return is just too small
Reply Private capital built the Heathrow link because there was plenty of potential revenue
July 30, 2026
Lord JR, you often make clear your dislike of anything ‘nationalised’ and I often disagree with you.
As with Water, the Rail service is a shambolic over-priced failure. Entirley due to privatisation, where profit, bonuses and ludicrously high salaries for the top people are more important that the product.
Whilst I acknowledge these two previously nationalised services were hardly faultless, privatisation has not improved them. Probably made them worse.
Surely in the 21st century, we could return these services to a nationalised base, with a strong government body over-seeing the operation. To monitor improvement and behaviours.
Reply Do understand all track,signals,stations,property have been nationalised all this century, and a government regulator fixes fares and timetables !
July 30, 2026
OA
The problem with taking over a nationalised operation is that IT HAS ALREADY FAILED, usually through lack of management skill, productivity, efficiency, and investment.
Given the above, it needs a huge amount of time (years) and investment (£Billions) to give any sort of a chance of improvement, success and payback.
You then have a Government Regulator to deal with, who perhaps over complicates all of planned/proposed changes/investment, with price caps, environmental regulations, timetable concerns, and Health and Safety.
Is it any wonder (part) privatisation fails, especially when government interference is so regular.
July 30, 2026
In the unlikley event we had the money, I feel the future of rail should be in the complete automation of it and shifting rail towards freight distribution, possibly with a modern version of ‘Ro-Railers’. Containers reduced the cost of global shipping by orders of magnitude, reducing handling (and time/theft/strike) costs by orders of magnitude. The same should be possible for a rail-based system, analogous to the automated warehouse systems currently in use but on a larger, national scale. Parcels & heavy goods don’t mind waiting or being shunted & sorted via distribution hubs, whilst passengers do.
I think the future of passenger transport is probably in autonomous road vehicles, both individual and group – essentially robotic taxis and buses. I suspect the amount of ‘private’ car ownership will dwindle, as running costs and taxes continue to increase and autonomous vehicles make pay-on-use more attractive.
July 30, 2026
Absolutely astounded to learn following the recent crash near Bedford that the brakes are not automatically applied on many stretches of line after a train passes a red signal. Is this the fault of private operators, nationalised Network Rail or both?
July 31, 2026
M_M
Yes I also thought that safety system was all put in place years ago, after similar accidents.
July 30, 2026
The ongoing take over of commercial activity by the state is just another part of the Public Sector believing they are the drivers of the economy. They believe they should be the ones in control of ever more facets of society. They fail to accept the reality, which is only private sector tax payers provide state funding. Money to pay for the excessive spend they continue to crave/demand can only come from outside the public sector. The Public Sector have yet to learn/accept it is only the Private sector that can ever be net wealth creators and thus nett tax payers. If anyone doubts that, then consider this. If a utility is owned by the state and generates a positive balance sheet, or profit as we call it in the private sector, then that excess over cost can only be generated by external revenue i.e. the private sector in a non state owned activity. If it wasn’t so, then excess/profit generated in any specific state industry coming from other state funded activity employees is simply transfer of money from one state pocket to the other. A civil servant paying for a train ticket on state rail is simply an inter department transfer
Economic growth can only ever be achieved by non state activity. Inter state departments activity is only departmental transfer of funds that were provided by others. Only Private Sector activity feeding wealth to the state coffers can generate growth. The alternative is state borrowing to drive the spiralling state spending.
I think we can all see which option successive governments have relied on this century……
July 30, 2026
Japan’s railways are famous for their speed, punctuality and cleanliness; they are private.
July 30, 2026
“How rail nationalisation went wrong in the 1970 s”
Is it fair to compare 1970s safety, computer and communications etc. technology with those of today? Today’s technology will inevitably improve the function of even an out-of-date technology such as steel wheels on a steel track. A big improvement would be the implementation of driverless trains. And even if rail is totally nationalised why cannot the contracts to run sections be awarded to private companies who offer the lowest price, rather than as before, the highest price? The nationalised entity setting the prices and timetables so as to make a sensible whole system.
July 30, 2026
All Western countries have exact same problem regarding rail. Not worth getting bogged down in. Japan has best rail but then its population more tightly compact which is good for rail and has much more lucrative real estate than others. So not a lot UK can do.
Rather, we should be scrapping HS2. And using some of that money to help turn London-Cambridge-Oxford into world’s second Silicon Valley. As well as do the same, but on lesser scale, for now, of helping to turn Manchester-Leeds-Sheffield into a power house for more heavy industry.
Whilst reducing tax and immigration. UK’s great future on a postage stamp.
July 30, 2026
“JR Hokkaido and JR Shikoku are nominally private companies, but 100% of their shares are held by the Japanese Independent Administrative Agency (similar to our public institutions) Railway Construction and Transportation Facilities Support Organization (JRTT for short), and their stocks are not publicly traded. Moreover, these two companies have been in a state of long-term losses, with their finances largely dependent on government subsidies. In summary, they are accountable to national agencies (even the discontinuation of lines and adjustments to ticket prices may require approval from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism), and their finances rely on state funds, essentially making them state-owned enterprises. However, when it comes to financial settlements, the losses are attributed to the companies themselves rather than the state (the financial statements are not consolidated into the parent company JRTT’s financial statements).”
“JR East achieved full privatization in 2002 (before the establishment of JRTT). JR West, JR Hokkaido, and JR Kyushu were originally 100% owned by JRTT, but because they held high-quality assets and did not require government support, JRTT gradually sold its shares in JR West, JR Hokkaido, and JR Kyushu in 2004, 2006, and 2016, respectively. Therefore, these companies are now largely independent of the state in terms of ownership and can generate profits independently without relying on government financial subsidies.”
“The Relationship Between Fully Privatized JR East, JR West, JR Hokkaido, and JR Kyushu and the Government
1. Some decisions require government approval:
Due to the public nature of railways, even fully privatized JR East, JR West, JR Hokkaido, and JR Kyushu still need government approval and must apply to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport, and Tourism for decisions on abandoning lines and adjusting fares.
In addition, the construction of other lines also requires approval from the national and local governments. For example, the Central Shinkansen being constructed by JR East has not yet obtained the approval of Shizuoka Prefecture, and is currently stalled, which is estimated to prevent it from being completed on time by 2027.”
July 30, 2026
The service the first company offers has dwindled fairly significantly in recent years and plans to continue to do so. Don’t know about the other.
So if Japan has the best railway in the world (not forgetting 1. Japan is highly built up which suits passenger railway and 2. Gets lots of revenue from its real estate), and we follow suit, that means the UK certainly appears it’s going to lose many of its services in the future.
(Again, why are we wasting £100 Billion on HS2. Not only is this an eye-watering waste of money but also the incompetence of those behind such decisions – the people who are going to make decisions about the future of our railways in general).
July 30, 2026
752 illegals arrived yesterday ….752 752 752 ……in comparison, a UK army infantry regiment has @500 soliders
July 30, 2026
+1
July 30, 2026
They simply don’t care for our security, personal or national, for if they did those arriving with no documentation would be detained in encampments and not allowed to freely roam our streets. They’ve seen the effects of multiculturalism in Cyprus, Yugoslavia, Lebanon and our own Northern Ireland and believe that this is just what we need in GB.
July 30, 2026
”three people were found dead aboard a small boat after launching from Dunkirk overnight, some 100km (62 miles) up the coast. French officials confirmed their death” https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c5yd2j93r7ro ……why was the boat allowed to continue to the UK, don’t the french police have to investigate the deaths, collect evidence, collect witness statements etc ….beyond belief
July 30, 2026
the problem with “railways” is that it is incapable of door-to-door delivery.I am referring to international trade
ships and planes.Long time ago I had to give an opinion about a “mixed concept” vessel for the chairman of
a major shipping company.I was already aware of the cause-for-thought development of SeaLand in USA
and that my employers had everything to enable containerisation logistics.In short I said this is neither
muck nor mickle.The concept was not proceeded with.The days when the British merchant navy ruled
the waves is long gone.The problem with the railways is simple “it is incapable of handling international
containerisation”.Haulage does it containerbase to destination or clearing centre for breakbulk distribution.
July 30, 2026
I don’t know what planet people are on that believe customers get treated better by the private sector. I’m afraid those days are long gone.
We get told what to do by the tech companies, banks close branches with no concern for keeping customers happy.
Only a few years ago supermarkets had signs up saying if there is more than one person in front of you we will open another till. They always asked “do you need any help”. Nowadays that has all gone and they don’t give a damn. Any thought that you have to please the customer is now non-existent; it is more like a privilege to get served.
July 31, 2026
+1
July 30, 2026
the British state is asking me to believe that 3 female illegal immigrants simultaneously had heart attacks and died on their dinghy journey, and they were not killed by the men in the boat.
the odds of 3 people in the same small group having heart attacks at the same time are off the scale.
the nudge units and their fantasies they peddle to the media are getting silly.
so in reality the men in the boat killed the females, and we now have murderers walking around our land.
if my mates and I killed 3 females there would be a massive man hunt by the police. it seems different rules apply to illegal immigrants.
seems elon musk is the only one talking sense about this country.
Reply I have not seen a statement from the UK authorities about heart attacks. The cause of death needs to be established and confirmed by medical examination. The women were said to be taken off the boat so they had not been killed and thrown overboard by other passengers.You cite no evidence to support your claim of murder.What remains clear is illegal and overcrowded boats are dangerous and need to be stopped by the French authorities.
July 31, 2026
…and that boat, after the french police collected the bodies, was allowed to continue to the UK …..have the british police detained everyone on the boat for investigation ….OH NO
July 31, 2026
somebody is feeding this narrative to the press
https://www.lbc.co.uk/article/three-migrants-found-dead-on-board-boat-in-the-english-channel-5HjdfLc_2/
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/07/30/four-migrants-drown-while-trying-to-cross-channel/
etc