Derailment at Paddington

[jamie92208]

To a point yes, but they tend to be career civil servants and as you go higher up the chain there is more stability. I've dealt with a lot of civil servants at the MoD, DECC as was and DafT (not railways) and most of them have been career people within their department and most of them have spent significant periods in post. In each case the individuals seemed to be conditioned by the corporate culture of their department which is why things are not as simple as imagining it is about individual short comings. Weirdly enough, the ones I have the most respect for and who tended to be pretty passionate, competent and with a decent understanding of the end users of their department were the MoD people yet they're the ones usually pilloried because of defence procurement issues.

When I was involved in a computer project I had quite a bit of contact with civil servants in the Home Office. Many of them were excellent but some were not. Several of the junior ones were treated like dirt with regard to expenses etc. However there was one occasion when I discovered a mistake in legislation that could have had quite serious consequences for operational supervisors. I rang the Home Office and talked to someone quite senior and suggested that a simple amendment could be put through in the Criminal Justice Bill that was just going through Parliament. His reply quite shocked me. It ran along these lines " Oh we won't do that my boss will use it to beat the Dept of Environment(who had made the mistake) over the head when he's in his club with his oppo." There was absolutely no concern for the end user on the streets at 3am.

 

Jamie

[jjb1970]

It has been increasingly obvious, for a long time, that the long-term effects of Tony Blair's assault on the Civil Service would be serious and long-lasting. The central joke of Yes, Minister was that Sir Humphrey genuinely DID know a great deal more than Jim Hacker, and Jim Hacker genuinely WAS as uninformed and incapable as he looked.

 

In a world managed by genuinely experienced managers with no particular party affiliation, and no ideological motivation beyond whether the system works, where is the role for politics for the sake of politics, or the exercise of patronage?

 

I think that's true. Another change of which I think the importance is difficult to over estimate is that at one time organisations like BR and the CEGB had a high degree of independence in how they managed themselves despite being state owned entities. Civil servants were kept at arms length and well out of operational processes. The combination of technocratic self managing organisations and a professional civil service at higher policy level kept a separation between operations and ensured that the necessary technical expertise to run industries was in place. Since privatisation there is no longer the same buffer and civil servants are now much closer to operational decision making and seem in many cases to genuinely believe that they posses greater knowledge and expertise than industry professionals. Taken together with the changes in the civil service from 1997 and the results have been pretty dire. And then there is that whole incestuous relationship between government and elements of private industry and finance and the system of government patronage that has had a truly corrosive impact and led to a ghastly culture of state patronage in which the only losers seem to be tax payers.

[TheSignalEngineer]

As the Stationmaster says in BR days when the brown stuff hit the fan every one mucked in, and you got to see quite senior people demonstrating that they still remembered how to do the basics. One that sticks in my mind is helping the Divisional Civil Engineers P-Way Assistant to tip mermaid wagons. The local TME who was of a more modern outlook was most unimpressed at being directed to help the Engineering Supervisor tip the adjacent wagon.

Been in that situation on numerous occasions. One commissioning where I was the person in overall charge of the shift on a commissioning a pre-existing fault was found at a mechanical fringe box and it was holding up progress. At the time I was briefing the boss from the Project Office which had been responsible for the design as to how the job was going. I knew what the problem was but it was a two-man job to fix it so he ended up spending an hour crawling about under a mechanical signal box in the early hours of the morning helping me. 

[Godfrey Glyn]

It has been increasingly obvious, for a long time, that the long-term effects of Tony Blair's assault on the Civil Service would be serious and long-lasting. The central joke of Yes, Minister was that Sir Humphrey genuinely DID know a great deal more than Jim Hacker, and Jim Hacker genuinely WAS as uninformed and incapable as he looked.

 

In a world managed by genuinely experienced managers with no particular party affiliation, and no ideological motivation beyond whether the system works, where is the role for politics for the sake of politics, or the exercise of patronage?

 

I rather think the problem started with Margaret Thatcher who brought in political advisors, a process that has continued with subsequent administrations. There has certainly been a politicisation of the civil service as a result. A large number of senior civil servants left education when the coalition government came in - of course that may have had something to do with the arrival of Michael Gove!

 

The problem with leaving it to the practitioners in any organisation is that they eventually end up running it for their own perceived benefit; for proper governance and effective provision there needs to be a (educated) balance between those who have oversight ( and ultimate responsibility for funding the operation ) and those who know what can be done and how to do it. That is far from easy in a large organisation.

I have recently enjoyed reading two books by Peter Barnfield about his trips around the west country branch lines in the early '60s; you get the impression that at times there was some valiant efforts made by the actual staff to make the system work whilst most of the time the industry never considered the actual needs of the users/passengers/customers.

 

There is one further point you can make about the civil service and it relates to the point  jjb1970 makes, there is a hierarchy in the civil service departments, some are seen as the place to be, some are not!

 

I think we are all saying that there are some fairly serious systemic problems in the rail industry at the moment which need to be sorted out, certainly as a non-railway person I am saddened and somewhat alarmed to read what the railway professionals have written in this topic.

 

It will require the electorate to better understand the situation the industry is in and one has to say that we, the electorate are not terribly sophisticated!

 

all the best

 

Godfrey

Edited August 23, 2017 by Godfrey Glyn

[rodent279]

Been in that situation on numerous occasions. One commissioning where I was the person in overall charge of the shift on a commissioning a pre-existing fault was found at a mechanical fringe box and it was holding up progress. At the time I was briefing the boss from the Project Office which had been responsible for the design as to how the job was going. I knew what the problem was but it was a two-man job to fix it so he ended up spending an hour crawling about under a mechanical signal box in the early hours of the morning helping me. 

That is good management. The sort that gets people on side.

[rodent279]

I rather think the problem started with Margaret Thatcher who brought in political advisors, a process that has continued with subsequent administrations. There has certainly been a politicisation of the civil service as a result. A large number of senior civil servants left education when the coalition government came in - of course that may have had something to do with the arrival of Michael Gove!

 

The problem with leaving it to the practitioners in any organisation is that they eventually end up running it for their own perceived benefit; for proper governance and effective provision there needs to be a (educated) balance between those who have oversight ( and ultimate responsibility for funding the operation ) and those who know what can be done and how to do it. That is far from easy in a large organisation.

I have recently enjoyed reading two books by Peter Barnfield about his trips around the west country branch lines; you get the impression that at times there was some valiant efforts made by the actual staff to make the system work whilst most of the time the industry never considered the actual needs of the users/passengers/customers.

 

There is one further point you can make about the civil service and it relates to the point  jjb1970 makes, there is a hierarchy in the civil service departments, some are seen as the place to be, some are not!

 

I think we are all saying that there are some fairly serious systemic problems in the rail industry at the moment which need to be sorted out, certainly as a non-railway person I am saddened and somewhat alarmed to read what the railway professionals have written in this topic.

 

It will require the electorate to better understand the situation the industry is in and one has to say that we, the electorate are not terribly sophisticated!

 

all the best

 

Godfrey

 

That's it then. We're stuffed..............

[TheSignalEngineer]

That is good management. The sort that gets people on side.

I always found that being willing to get involved went down well with my staff when running a depot, provided that you could show that you knew what you were doing. Mess it up and you were straight down the pan.

 

Sadly today there is no continuity or progression through the industry. When I started as a Signal Engineering Student the first thing you learnt after how to survive on track was how to dig a hole, lay a rodding run, put up signals, wire and set up electrical equipment, time in the Works etc etc. Two years of boots on the ballast with the men at the sharp end. Then it was the same again through all the technical, supervisory and management side. 

[Trog]

That is good management. The sort that gets people on side.

 

Leading by example in many ways the simplest and best form of management. Show the blokes that you think doing something is important enough that you are willing to do it yourself, and all but the worst of them will be happy to help.

[The Johnster]

We had a 'fresh out of university' train crew manager at Severn Tunnel Junction back in my day, degree and all sorts of qualifications and no experience, plus the disadvantage of a rather nice middle class accent.  He was always willing to ask questions and find things out, to learn from experience, and take notice of things, and, despite a rocky start which really wasn't his fault, quickly became a popular and respected manager, or at least the nearest he could be to one as everybody thought all managers were rubbish (and one or two were!).  It is the 'I know best so do what I say because I'm better than you' attitude that puts people's back up, because it always means that the bloke doesn't know anything and is trying to blag and bullly his way through the situation, knowing that you've got to clean the mess up.  The other thing that use to get my goat, although some blokes liked the simplicity of it I think, was the 'officers and men' attitude of managers of a certain age and background, but the good thing about this approach was that, however rough a time they gave you, they would carry the can and protect you from the worst of what came down from On HIgh.

 

BR management in my day (the 70s) was actually pretty good, certainly compared to most private industry of the time where the bosses seemed to go out of their way to provoke industrial relations issues, and better than in the Steel industry where, so far as I could make out, the managers never left the offices or had any contact with the workers at all; effectively, the ship was 'not under command'.  There was still a residual Beeching attitude that modernisation meant closing it all down and selling off the land for development, and they were still in positions where they could do a lot of damage, but the reaction to that was beginning to set in.  Passenger stock was rapidly being modernised with mk2s, then 3s, timetables improved, and the freight business was carried on well enough against a background of continually falling traffic and revenues.  BR were the best bosses I ever worked for.

[TheSignalEngineer]

Leading by example in many ways the simplest and best form of management. Show the blokes that you think doing something is important enough that you are willing to do it yourself, and all but the worst of them will be happy to help.

I found tea was also useful. On big weekends I would fill my bag with vending machine style cup packs of tea, coffee, hot chocolate and soup. There were also a couple of hotel-size hot water flasks in the car. Get to a team working at a remote spot and ask if they'd got a kettle. Ten minutes chat with a hot drink in the early hours usually seemed to boost performance. And I usually 'forgot' to pick up one or more of the packs, win-win situation for a pound or two.

[APOLLO]

Every gas emergency call out team had a kettle and brewing equipment / supplies also. Like the railways the "gas board" ran on tea !!!! I had my own cup / tea bags & kit kats etc in the car - part of my "survival kit". Being duty engineer in winter meant you rarely got home until late evening. Another of my "duties" was, if the job seemed to be a long one / all nighter was to go to the local chip shop before it closed & feed us all. Many times we have worked from 5pm right through to 8am next morning, in all weathers. I'm not complaining - we were paid well and our managers were all experienced engineers who had "been there, done that", so we received very little if any grief from them, so long as we sorted the job safely, and kept the customer happy. (customer was king back then).

 

Not like that these days so I am told !!!!

 

Brit15

[Zomboid]

I think that kind of thing is a consequence of modern career progression. There's very little reward for staying in one place for any length of time these days, so the people who make any progress up the ladder have typically hopped around here and there, and probably find themselves hierarchically senior to some people where they only have the vaguest notion of what they actually do.

 

Not specifically a railway/ NR phenomenon, I think it covers pretty much every facet of every industry.

[The Stationmaster]

I think that kind of thing is a consequence of modern career progression. There's very little reward for staying in one place for any length of time these days, so the people who make any progress up the ladder have typically hopped around here and there, and probably find themselves hierarchically senior to some people where they only have the vaguest notion of what they actually do.

 

Not specifically a railway/ NR phenomenon, I think it covers pretty much every facet of every industry.

 

Interesting thing in BR was that it was generally reckoned in career progression terms that three years in a managerial post was about the right length of time and some of the high-flyers were moved more rapidly than that.  Overall, provided you had the background knowledge to enable you to get a grasp of a job that wasn't too bad although I would have thought 4 years was probably better as at least it avoided you getting stale although there were plenty of posts where that wasn't some important and knowledge and experience were far more important.

 

Seeing Johnsters' comments about 1970s South Wales is interesting as probably more so than the rest of the Western that Division in the first half of the 1970s had more Area Managers, and Asst A.M.s who hard 'risen through the ranks' than the other two Divisions although the Bristol Division wasn't that far behind but South Wales had at least one AM who had started as an Engine Cleaner, one who had started as a C&W Greaser, another who had started as a Shunter before becoming a Goods Guard, 2 who had started as the modern equivalent of Premium Apprentices  (at which level virtually all the Area Maintenance Engineers had started) and several who had been Stationmasters in earlier years.  The same could be said of most of the important Divisional officers with, again, one who had started as an Engine Cleaner, and several who had started in lowly clerical positions and so on.

 

Oddly at the end of the WR in 1992 almost the entire operations/operations planning senior management were 'time served' railwaymen who had not entered as graduates and there was no doubt on the part of several of us that we could do any of the  jobs of our staff because in most instances we had either done such jobs ourselves in the past or had the necessary knowledge to enable us to do them - in fact in my team I had two chaps who I'd worked with over 20 years earlier in freight planning in the London Division.  Alas virtually all of that sort of experience has been driven out of that part of the industry due to retirements, redundancy and job relocations aimed at reducing costs.  Whether that is an improvement or not is, of course, open to question but some very large gulfs in knowledge and experience were opened up in the late 1990s.  However perhaps even more oddly in the train operating company where I finished up the senior part of the operations team was, again, entirely 'time served railwaymen' and three (of the four) of us had at some time or other been Area Managers so had ground level operating experience while our 4th colleague had started as an Engine Cleaner;  but that sort of thing wasn't too unusual in the early years of privatisation.

[jjb1970]

There are certain things that can only be learned in real time. I'm not one of those that venerates experience above all else as I've worked with plenty who've had decades of experience and who are still hopeless and have worked with plenty of youngsters who were as sharp as tacks and extremely intelligent but it is true that experience matters. Usually the clever youngsters know this themselves and are very keen to get the advice of old salts and utilise the experience of those around them. The ones who come in with an "I know best and you'll do as you're told" often end up falling flat on their faces. I think most organisations expect some degree of mobility if people want to progress up the greasy pole, that's not to say they don't value those who opt out of that but I must admit I think staying in the same post too long can be unhealthy as it is easy to become institutionalised. I worked for a fine organisation, an extremely highly respected one where it was normal for people to remain with the organisation until they retired (or died) and that created many benefits (corporate knowledge retention was great, there was a great working atmosphere and people had an amazing loyalty to the organisation) but the downside was that many of the guys were resistant to change of any sort and ended up so specialised that they'd be of little value anywhere else which is a bit unhealthy. As with most things it is about balance.

[rodent279]

There are certain things that can only be learned in real time. I'm not one of those that venerates experience above all else as I've worked with plenty who've had decades of experience and who are still hopeless and have worked with plenty of youngsters who were as sharp as tacks and extremely intelligent but it is true that experience matters. Usually the clever youngsters know this themselves and are very keen to get the advice of old salts and utilise the experience of those around them. The ones who come in with an "I know best and you'll do as you're told" often end up falling flat on their faces. I think most organisations expect some degree of mobility if people want to progress up the greasy pole, that's not to say they don't value those who opt out of that but I must admit I think staying in the same post too long can be unhealthy as it is easy to become institutionalised. I worked for a fine organisation, an extremely highly respected one where it was normal for people to remain with the organisation until they retired (or died) and that created many benefits (corporate knowledge retention was great, there was a great working atmosphere and people had an amazing loyalty to the organisation) but the downside was that many of the guys were resistant to change of any sort and ended up so specialised that they'd be of little value anywhere else which is a bit unhealthy. As with most things it is about balance.

 

Loyalty is rarely rewarded or respected these days.

 

I think as important as experience is an ability and willingness to learn, and (a large dose of) flexibility & adaptability. No one likes a smart arse, so if you've any sense, you listen to those around you.

[rodent279]

To get back on topic-how often would a stretch of platform road at a major terminus such as Paddington require renewal?

Could some of that track potentially have been around since the real GWR was in existence?

Edited August 23, 2017 by rodent279

[TheSignalEngineer]

Echoing SM's post, at the first depot I worked at the Special Class Inspector started as an S&T labourer, his assistants were an Engineering Student (Premium Apprentice on some departments) and a signalman who transferred to the S&T. The Divisional Engineer and his No1 assistant were Engineering Students, the other senior assistants and section heads included two Engineering Students, the rest starting in the bottom grades of outdoor staff or as office juniors. 

[The Stationmaster]

To get back on topic-how often would a stretch of platform road at a major terminus such as Paddington require renewal?

Could some of that track potentially have been around since the real GWR was in existence?

 

All the paddington platform lines were relayed some years ago although I'm not sure if any of teh sections where there is baulk road were relaid during the early/mid 1990s renewals.  If they weren't relaid then the track there (which definitely doesn't date from steam days let alone GWR times) was probably done in the 1980s.

 

Rail wear at the stop block ends of the platforms should be fairly minimal I would think although traction power is obviously applied in that area but speeds are very low.

[The Johnster]

Rail wear is minimal, but the rail at that point has some fairly heavy loading as trains brake to a stand on it and bear down momentarily.  And it may be subject to some wear as departing HSTs spin and struggle for grip as the power is taken up.  I doubt if either of these are major factors, but might play a part if clips were loose or the rail was becoming out of gauge for any reason.

[Titan]

I would imagine that the timbers would rot out before the rail becomes worn anyway.

[Miss Prism]

In happier days, Platform 2 seemed to be the favoured platform for loading horse boxes and carriage trucks.

 

 

Offtopic, I know, but this thread is rather gloomy!

 

 

[The Johnster]

I would imagine that the timbers would rot out before the rail becomes worn anyway.

 

Probably not; they are, in that location, soaked thoroughly in oil, grease, and diesel which acts as a preservative, and a fire risk...

[Titan]

Probably not; they are, in that location, soaked thoroughly in oil, grease, and diesel which acts as a preservative, and a fire risk...

 

And toilet waste...

[TheSignalEngineer]

I would imagine that the timbers would rot out before the rail becomes worn anyway.

More likely that the timbers would suffer from compression damage with the weight of standing power cars and splitting due to pressure on the baseplate fastenings.

[Titan]

More likely that the timbers would suffer from compression damage with the weight of standing power cars and splitting due to pressure on the baseplate fastenings.

 

I would have thought that would be as a result of inadequate design rather than old age/wear.