The early afternoon of Wednesday 6 August was an unremarkable one on the rail network. Then suddenly, shortly before 14:00, a power failure brought trains across the north-west of England to a halt. Chaos ensued: passengers told the BBC they were stranded on platforms for hours, with some having to book hotels for the night.
This incident, stemming from a short power cut that affected Network Rail's operating centre in Manchester, was, in itself, unusual. But it added to a difficult summer for train passengers. Repeated heatwaves required risk control measures like speed reductions to avoid tracks being damaged in the heat, leading to delays and cancellations.
There was a serious derailment near Lewes, East Sussex, and another smaller-scale incident near Wickford in Essex soon after. Against a backdrop of relatively high cancellation rates and steep fares compared with previous decades, rail users could be forgiven for forming the impression that things are not working. Something is changing, though: Labour is steadily bringing nearly all passenger rail services into public hands.
Nationalisation is a popular idea - a YouGov tracker poll suggests almost two thirds of the public support public ownership. But in reality, plans are still in their early stages. Big structural changes have yet to be introduced.
And experts caution that it's too early to say how successful these will be. So can rail nationalisation meet the public's expectations? Or are the ongoing delays and cancellations that we're currently seeing under a part-nationalised network a sign that it might struggle to deliver real improvement?
South Western Railway (SWR) was nationalised in May 2025, the first of six services to be brought into public ownership under Labour so far. At Woking station, which is served by SWR, regular commuter Leo tells me he had been optimistic about public ownership, but hasn't noticed it making any difference so far: "I think the phrase 'emperor's new clothes' comes to mind… it's still unreliable." SWR saw a clear increase in cancellations during its first year in public hands. But how much of this was due to nationalisation?
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