Warning that Great British Railways risks repeating the mistakes of British Rail

The Centre for Policy Studies (CPS), a leading centre-right think tank that aims to develop “a new generation of conservative thinking, built around promoting enterprise, ownership and prosperity”, has published a report warning that government’s plans for the introduction of Great British Railways (GBR) risk repeating the mistakes of the past and, in its planned form, will slash accountability, with most of the independent regulator’s duties stripped and transferred to GBR.

Written by Tony Lodge, a CPS research fellow who has authored a number of railway reports in the past, the report claims that government ministers seem to be demonstrating “profound and misguided hostility to open access rail competition, which has been the biggest railway success story in recent decades”.

The report also claims that, unless GBR adopts a customer-first focus and does more to capitalise on the wider rail estate, the network will remain heavily dependent on public subsidy.

In the report, entitled “Rail’s Last Chance: A four-point plan to save the railways”, Tony Lodge sets out his plan to ensure that GBR does not repeat the mistakes of the past, including quotas for open access on all main intercity lines.

The four elements of Lodge’s plan are:

1. The government and GBR need to protect and promote open access passenger services, which have delivered better services, more routes, faster trains, and cheaper tickets. The report highlights the fact that open-access competition on the East Coast main line (ECML) has not just seen new, popular rail operators enter the market, but pushed the dominant franchise operator, LNER, to deliver better for its customers. Lodge notes that European railways that are copying Britain’s existing open access model on the ECML have seen a 40% increase in passengers and fare reductions of 20-60%.
   The CPS report also argues that, while open access trains already represent 20% of services on the ECML, other long-distance intercity routes should aim for a minimum of 10% open access by 2030, to replicate this success across the network.
2. Great British Railways should not be able to mark its own homework – for example, by deciding which operators get access to its tracks. Instead, the Office for Road and Rail should retain its independent regulatory powers both to scrutinise GBR and its operations, alongside ensuring standards are upheld and costs are controlled.
3. GBR must adopt a ruthless focus on making train travel as easy, cheap and user-friendly as possible, not least when designing a new GBR ticketing app to replace those of the existing train operating companies. This would include not just addressing the complexity and cost of fares, but more imaginative ideas such as a ‘Rail Miles’ loyalty scheme, or combining rail tickets with other bookings such as hospitality and retail.
4. Current plans miss a range of opportunities for the rail estate to generate wider ancillary income. Commercial and residential development, renewable energy generation, light parcel freight, health hubs at stations, alongside a higher quality retail offering, are all underutilised sources of income for the railways.
   The report argues that the rail sector’s 52,000 hectares could generate massive renewable energy and development income, learning from countries like Japan, where railways earn one-third of their revenue from non-ticket sources such as retail.
   Ministers estimate that the Network Rail estate has the potential capacity to generate 188 MWp (Megawatts peak) of solar power across 34 sites. This could power the equivalent of between 140,000 to 180,000 homes and earn the railway tens of millions of pounds in new revenue. The report urges ministers to explore this, and to go further, considering lineside solar generation along suitable parts of Britain’s 9,848 miles of rail network.

Tony Lodge, author of ‘Rail’s Last Chance’, said: “It is hard to avoid the conclusion that Great British Railways is a solution looking for a problem – prioritising the nationalisation of the railways over their effective and efficient operation.

“That said, Labour is committed to bringing it forward and has the parliamentary mandate to do so. It is critical then that GBR is designed and run with customer focus at its heart; encouraging innovation and competition, promoting open access, supporting rail freight, and maximising income from the wider railway estate.

“Without this, Great British Railways will merely resurrect the ghost of British Rail, with all the poor performance, taxpayer subsidy, and passenger dissatisfaction that came with it.”