Labour plans to abolish Network Rail

The Labour Party will scrap Network Rail as part of its plans to hand over running of the railways to a new Great British Railways (GBR) body.

Shadow Transport Secretary Louise Haigh was quoted in the Sunday Times as saying: “Network Rail has had to contend with maintaining aged infrastructure across a deeply fragmented rail system, where incentives are not property aligned. Network Rail will be abolished.”

Labour plans to create a new Great British Railways (GBR) body and will take over franchises as they expire, thus avoiding the cost of nationalising other private held assets, such as utilities.

The aim is to bring the railways into public ownership by the end of a first term in government.

However, rail industry experts have warned that several franchises have slipped into public ownership already.

Writing in Rail magazine, veteran transport expert Christian Wolmar said “messing about with the structure” without tangible improvements could prove a huge problem for a Labour government. 

“Renationalisation may be superficially popular, but few people really understand the implications,” he said.

Labour has said it will bring private train services into public ownership as contracts reach their end.

“We’ll establish a new body – Great British Railways – and a tough new passenger watchdog to hold them to account on behalf of passengers,” Haigh has said.

“We have, as I have set out, and Rachel Reeves has repeatedly set out, ironclad fiscal rules,” she said. “These reforms are within them because we won’t have to pay compensation when the railway operations contracts expire.”

Involving Metro Mayors with devolved transport powers, would also be part of Labour’s plans for a publicly owned railway.

Andy Burnham and Steve Rotheram, Greater Manchester and Liverpool City Region mayors made a proposal to improve transport links between the North West’s two powerhouse cities with a rail board to oversee a new link.

But the city region Mayors want to expand their powers over transport. Burnham has his eyes set on taking commuter lines in Greater Manchester into the orbit of Transport for Greater Manchester.

Haigh also pledged to expand the rail freight sector, which the current government has set a growth target of 75% in net freight by 2050, which it set in December 2023.

Quoted in Rail magazine, Maggie Simpson, RFG director general, said: “We are pleased that the Labour Party have highlighted the huge economic potential of rail freight and are committed to measures including statutory duties for freight and long-term growth targets.

“Our members are working to get more goods moving by rail, and we strongly welcome this support.”

Railway Industry Association (RIA) chief executive, Darren Caplan said: “We welcome the pledge to make rail reform a priority early in the next parliament, which would give certainty to our members about the future structure of the railway industry, and the commitment to a long-term strategy, which RIA has been calling for in recent years.”