Former Railtrack chief executive Gerald Corbett has warned that the government’s plans for Great British Railways will leave the industry’s ‘directing mind’ at risk of interference by ministers.
Mr Corbett was speaking as he launched his new book ‘When something happens – Inside Railtrack: a CEO shares his story for the first time’, in which he recollects his years at Railtrack after it had been floated on the Stock Market in 1996 as part of privatisation.
He was in charge of Railtrack when there were two major accidents at Ladbroke Grove and Hatfield.
Speaking exclusively to Railnews, he said the collision at Ladbroke Grove between a Thames Trains service and an oncoming Great Western HST had placed the effectiveness of Thames Trains’ driver training in doubt as one of several contributing causes, but the failure of a rail at Hatfield under a GNER train, which was catastrophically derailed, was a result of the fragmentation of the railway under privatisation.
He said: ‘When Hatfield happened, it manifestly was Railtrack’s accountability, although it was our maintenance contractor who was part of the problem, because it was our area of responsibility. So I took the accountability and immediately tendered my resignation. And then I got a tremendous amount of support, because people could see all the steps we had taken to improve the railway.
‘We checked all the rails, but a month later the Board asked me to leave. The chairman told me: everyone’s attacking us, and we think if you go they will stop attacking us.
’I think a reintegrated railway is a good thing, but I think eventually the old problems of reporting to a minister and being subject to the Treasury’s annual cash controls and running it as a public service will slowly re-emerge, and I think that parts of it will be reprivatised, but in a different way, and I look towards the creation of a privatised, integrated railway, maybe along the lines of the Big Four before 1948.’
What do you think? Click here to let us know.