People want a single body to run our railways again. Perhaps we should call it British Rail?

Is the rail-travelling public crying out for a new quango? No. Passengers simply want trains that run on time – and with a seat for all who want one

Even in the lull between closures over Easter and the early May bank holiday, rail travel at London Euston has not exactly been problem free.

Serco, which runs the overnight Caledonian Sleeper between the English capital and dozens of stations in Scotland, chose Sunday night to launch its new £100m rolling stock. A series of Network Rail issues from Carstairs to Wembley meant that the overnight “express” from Edinburgh to London achieved a sedate average speed of 32mph. Many passengers arrived at their destination over three hours late, with the contingent bound for Fort William reaching the town only in the early afternoon of Monday.

By Tuesday morning, the Rail Delivery Group (RDG) – representing the train operators and Network Rail – had revealed its hand to the Williams Rail Review. This is the body chaired by former British Airways boss, Keith Williams, who is obliged “to recommend the most appropriate organisational and commercial frameworks to deliver the government’s vision”. And that vision? “A railway that is able to offer good value fares for passengers, while keeping costs down for taxpayers.” The review’s chairman is also supposed to improve industrial relations, reduce disruption and improve reliability.

The best way to achieve these aims, says the RDG, is to devolve day-to-day control from the Department for Transport (DfT) to “a new independent national organising body in charge of the whole industry, acting as the glue that binds it together”.

Is the rail-travelling public crying out for a new quango? No. Passengers simply want trains that run on time with a seat for all who want one. And when things inevitably go wrong, they expect timely and accurate information about delays so they can respond intelligently. The average traveller couldn’t care less whether those modest demands are met by a public-private partnership, a single monolithic nationalised entity, or, for that matter, the previously untried dream team of Lord Sugar and Gareth Southgate.

Passengers have, however, lost trust with the current system: customer satisfaction hit a 10-year low in 2018, largely because of the horribly botched introduction of new timetables in May of that year. Every late arrival or cancelled train triggered lost work hours or family time, which squandered confidence in the railway. Never have I seen passengers so angry and upset as those stuck on the platforms at Harpenden and Bolton.

So the affable Williams needs to minimise future disruption – and maximise the wider social and economic benefits for the long-suffering taxpayer who bankrolls the whole fearfully expensive railway.

In fact, that amorphous term “railway” is part of the problem. Consider all the passengers who stare up at the departure board at Euston on a typical day. They may all use the same London terminus, but they represents very different constituencies.

The majority of UK rail passengers are commuters in southeast England, for whom trains are necessary evil to achieve some sort of work-life equilibrium. They crave reliability and loathe the annual January fare increase; one very senior railway figure describes a season ticket as “the ultimate distress purchase”. At the other extreme are the Caledonian Sleeper snoozers, paying a premium fare to be lulled to Scotland in style. The train operator’s competition comprises the airlines and hotels who could instead be accommodating the Anglo-Scottish market. And in between there are the inter-city travellers, many of whom could switch to the roads to reach Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool. For them, speed, reliability and cost are the important variables.

Naturally, there are overlaps: the morning Virgin Trains departure from Holyhead to Euston connects communities in North Wales with Chester, and carries longer-distance commuters from Rugby to the capital. And if a London Northwestern “outer suburban” train breaks down at Willesden, everyone will know about it. The schedule fiasco last May was down to the absence of a controlling mind. A new body might constitute just another layer of complexity in a system that is already an organisational nightmare – but with the right person in charge, who recognises the diverse needs of rail passengers, it could look beyond the prevailing short-termism and political blame culture, and facilitate the expansion and acceleration of the nation’s trains.

Perhaps we should call it British Rail.