Government control of Britain’s railways 1993-2014: A systems of provision approach

The privatisation of Britain’s railways was intended to reduce government involvement, but led to increased government control. Through the Systems of Provision approach, this paper synthesises archival material to examine how increased government control developed and why. It finds that it resulted primarily from policymakers’ expectation that, as in other utilities, privatisation would attract private finance without requiring greater government intervention. In practice, private finance increased the costs of provision over the long term, and, because of political limits to fare increases, this made the railway ever more dependent on government subsidy. In response, governments sought to attract greater private finance into the system to minimise immediate subsidy requirements; this, however, necessitated reforms that led to greater government control and further increased costs. This unsustainable dynamic culminated in 2014, when the railways’ infrastructure debt was forced onto the government’s balance sheet and the government took near-total control of the infrastructure.