Ideas for electability: A Mutual British Railways

By John Ruddy

One of the strangest things to have happened before and during the general election was that the Conservative Party discovered co-operatives. We had the John Lewis model applied to healthcare, the John Lewis model applied to the Royal Mail, and we even had it applied to councils. Now they are in power, things will probably be different. But Labour is the only party which has had the co-operative movement at its core since it was founded, and that is why I am proposing that we nationalise the railways, and turn them into a co-operative.

In my opinion, one of the biggest mistakes of the last Labour government was in not following through in its promise in 1997 to reverse the botched Tory privatisation of the rail system. We inherited a system where we had a network operator (Railtrack) who saw its primary function as a property developer with some odd sidelines, and numerous private operators who saw their primary role in maximising their profit, and meeting their contractual obligations.

All the time the costs of the system kept rising, so that by 2002, the subsidy to the railways was roughly 3 times that needed by BR at the peak of the previous boom in 1989. Since then costs have risen further, not helped by a lack of accountability at the organisation Labour tasked with taking over responsibility for the railway infrastructure, Network Rail. Very little of this money has filtered through into improvements, as many of these are under-written by the Department for Transport in franchise agreements.

What I am proposing is the creation of a mutual British Railways. Even the Conservatives have held up John Lewis as an example of an efficient, well run business, providing good customer service. Needless to say, industrial relations are good at John Lewis, and at the Co-Operative Group, with employees focused on providing excellent customer service, and growing the organisation, thus increasing revenues. The beauty of this is that it will actually cost very little.

We can turn Network Rail into the core of the new British Railways. Our sister organisation, the Co-Op Party has launched a campaign called “The Peoples Rail”. I plan to go one step further and incorporate each franchise as it comes up for renewal. First up for renewal after the next election in 2015 will be London Midland, followed by First Great Western and Arriva Cross-Country in 2016 and South West Trains in 2017. We would bring accountability back to our rail system, as well as turning it into something which genuinely works for the good of its passengers. As well as being one of the consistently most popular policies in opinion polls. An example of the real ‘Big Society’ that only Labour can create.