I’m sure that last sentence came out wrong. The shambles is the way successive Tory (and "New Labour") governments have mishandled privatisation. Granted, using LNER for the new re-re-nationalised lines - which, I am sure we all remember, the last time they were under government control were making a profit and paying into the Exchequer until they were arbitrarily privatised again by the current lot of Herberts in Westminster - could be seen to besmirch the former company name. One, perhaps, might say the same for Southern Railway.
I fully agree Heather. I think it is often forgotten that a significant amount of the cost of the ECML electrification was paid for by profits generated under BR.
I used the railways a lot at the tail-end of BR and the descriptions of the network used by those who wanted an excuse to privatise them [and ride their own gravy-trains into the process] was one that I simply did not recognise from my own travelling experience throughout the 1980s. One friend who was a BR Area Manager at the time said to me that on privatisation, the first thing they did was to sack anyone who knew anything about running a railway!
Buying a ticket wasn't the needing a degree process that it is today either. You just turned up at the station, told the booking clerk where you wanted to go and very roughly when you wanted to return, and guess what? You got a ticket! No price penalty for travelling then and there and you could break your journey, and continue on without re-booking - and, provided it was within the time period, come back when you wanted. Sort of like an integrated transport system.
The sooner it is all taken back into public ownership the better IMHO, at least on the passenger side.
DJP/MMP