A joint nationalised industry success

IT was an excellent article on the Selby diversion (October issue), illustrating when the nationalised industries all worked together for the common aim of energy security. Contrast that with today, where major strategic projects have to navigate a myriad of private or independent agencies, but expect the same tax payer to fund the endeavour.

I was introduced to one strange sub-project of the Selby coalfield that never saw the drawing board in the 1990s. At the time, I was a trades union organiser representing many members in administrative and clerical roles in the coal industry. The industry was in rapid decline and, during one consultation meeting on how that decline would be managed, parties mused on the failure of the Selby coalfields to absorb displaced North East miners. I observed that would have been unlikely at scale because of housing related issues.

A very senior manager replied, “We would not have moved them to Selby, we would have transported them on a modified high speed train with clean area, showers, basic catering and dirty areas – with at least 200 kitted up ready to go straight down the Selby mine after picking up a lamp and token, and on the way back washed and brushed up ready to get off at Tursdale, where a central boarding point would have been created with access to the ECML.”

Being a seasoned rail enthusiast, I dismissed the concept as fantasy. But thanks for a brief walk down memory lane, and reminding us that the nationalised rail industry got it right more often than wrong.

Dennis Morgan, Durham