Review: British Rail: a new history - Christian Wolmar ****

By Brian Clegg

If you’re interested in railways – and it’s hard to imagine why you would buy this book if you’re not – this is a fascinating exploration of the rise and fall of British Railways/British Rail from nationalisation in 1948 through to privatisation in the mid-1990s.

Along the way, we take in the phasing out of steam (and why, unlike many other countries we mostly converted to diesel), the infamous Beeching cuts of the network in the 1960s, successes such as the 125 mile per hour High Speed Train with the InterCity brand and more. What comes across most strongly is the way that interference from government has time and again messed things up. It’s not that the railway management itself was without faults – particularly in the way that the old regions, reflecting the four private companies that were taken over, tried to still do things their own way. And Christian Wolmar is no fan of the many restrictive practices that had to be gradually removed in the face of resistance from staff. Similarly, the London-centric management never properly handled what was dismissively referred to as the ‘Provincial’ region. But time and again, the government got it wrong.

Whether it was Beeching’s total mishandling of the necessary pruning of some of the oddities and low usage branch lines left over from Victorian railway expansion, removing many valuable connections and stations, the inability to properly account for the need to subsidise some lines for the public good, or a lack of recognition of good management practice where it was brought into play, successive governments, both Conservative and Labour, have proved totally incapable of understanding the country’s rail needs – while the Treasury has resisted every sensible investment to improve the railways from day one. And, of course, the story ends with the disastrous privatisation, just when BR was getting its act together, that has resulted in far more public subsidy than was previously the case – plus terrible services in some areas. Wolmar holds up some hope for the planned formation of Great British Railways, an oversight body taking in most of Britain’s railways – but since the book was written, that too seems to be suffering from government mishandling.

From the point of view of a railway enthusiast dating back to peak diesel, the book’s biggest fault is an over-concentration on politics and details of management structures. Of course this is important, but it is given too much detail sometimes, where some of the niceties of the experience of being a rail traveller in the BR period could have had more coverage. The favourites of late 60s/early 70s trainspotters, the Deltics, do get a couple of mentions – but no real details. The beautiful, if flaky, diesel hydraulic Western class aren’t even named – they get lumped in with a general criticism of the Western Region’s attempt to do it their way. And I would have liked to have seen more detail, for example, of the seating, food provided in the dining cars and suchlike.

However, I can’t deny that the politics, management and strategy (or lack of it) that are explored here are central to understanding what happened to British Rail, why it got better – and why it wasn’t far better still. A must for UK rail fans.

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Now Appearing is the blog of science writer Brian Clegg (www.brianclegg.net), author of Inflight Science, Before the Big Bang and The God Effect.