Britain’s new government, led by the left-wing Labour Party, has committed to nationalising the railways in Great Britain. There have been nationalisations of Britain’s railways in the past, all of them during or just after wars. This one is the first peacetime intervention and the first to leave rail freight to its own management.

Britain’s railway nationalisation will be very different from the periods of government-directed control experienced over the past century. After thirty years as a collection of private operations, the new Labour government intends to carry out its election pledge to bring the railways back under public control. However, that pledge is largely confined to regional and long-distance passenger operations in England. The private rail freight operators will retain their commercial status.

Freight remaining in the private sector

The last nationalisation took place in a big-bang switchover, on New Year’s Day, 1948. This time it will be different. Existing passenger train franchises have already been reverting to government operation, and that process will continue as those contracts expire. Freight though has weathered all the storms of privatisation. It may be a thin-margin business, but for freight, privatisation has worked, at least in the slimmest of commercial terms.

What part the green agenda might play remains to be seen. The government would like to see more freight on rail, but how that might be achieved is another matter. With the freight sector in private hands, any financial support or subsidy would be extremely contentious. However, the rail freight lobby will argue that the cost base is already unfairly stacked against rail, especially when compared to road transport.

Vastly different economic pressures today

Back in 1948, almost all forms of mass transit came under direct government management, including rail, road and waterways. The UK post-war economy then was very much more dependent on heavy industry and domestic manufacturing. Today’s service economy is commuter-fuelled, and passenger transport has a much higher priority. It’s also worth noting that intermodal containers do not have a vote.

Even though it is a huge undertaking, the nationalisation is considerably less ambitious than its post-war counterpart. This version will be confined to taking passenger rail operations back under the wing of the Department for Transport. This will create a unique relationship on the British railway network. For the first time, state-owned passenger trains will run alongside private freight trains.

Cross-border and public-private diplomacy

It’s not just the liaison between the passenger and freight sectors that will take careful planning. The devolved administrations in Wales and Scotland already have control of railways in those territories. The matter is further complicated in that English-headquartered passenger train operators run cross-border trains into Wales and Scotland. Timetabling has always been in part a science of logistics, and in part an art of collaboration. In Northern Ireland, transport has always been a devolved responsibility. Cross-border operations into the Republic of Ireland seem to be easier to manage with a foreign power than between the ‘home nations’.

The nationalisation in Britain includes a role for the proposed new infrastructure agency, Great British Railways, which is preparing for freight growth. GBR will also become the management agency for passenger operations unless that power is retained by the DfT. That sets up the probability that private-sector freight will be contracted to provide trains for the public-sector infrastructure agency, to work on network improvements that, ultimately will benefit passenger services. Anyone expecting nationalisation to equate to a simplification of the railways will need to think again.