Cliff Perry began by describing his background as a third-generation railwayman and the various roles that he had played, starting with the nationalised British Railways through to privately-owned train operating companies and finally as a safety consultant.
He set out the current position of the railways in the UK as being among the safest in Europe, by whatever measure was chosen. It is now nearly nine years since a passenger was killed in a railway accident. Mr. Perry asserted that this was not a matter of good luck but down to changes that had taken place over recent years.
Some politicians and critics argue that Britain's railways would be better and safer under unified state control, 'safety before profits', but our speaker was of the opinion that fragmentation and the need for return on capital by necessity produced a safe railway. 'Small is Beautiful' and 'A Reliable Railway Is A Safe Railway' were good working mantras, he had found.
The changes that had taken place could be categorised under Plant, People and Process.
Plant included 'things' like trains, tracks and signals. Improvements had been made to trains such as adding crumple zones, stiffening structures, fitting laminated glass and improving drawgear to keep trains upright following any derailment. Over the last 15 years TPWS (Train Protection & Warning System) had been rolled-out across the fleet and network and had demonstrably reduced SPADs (Signals Passed At Danger). Trackside monitoring of wheels enabled early detection of problems. It was shown that 'flat-wheels' were a seasonal problem, peaking during periods of low adhesion, (falling leaves in Autumn), but that since the introduction of these systems the underlying trend was downwards. Even relatively simple things like the use of LEDs for signalling improved reliability and timekeeping.
People working on the railway are now better trained with railway 'academies' and certification schemes. Managers are expected to show leadership and engender a culture of safe working. A simple example was given of a rail gang now being aware of where exit points from the railway were and the location of the nearest hospital before starting work. Our speaker had been sceptical of the benefits of concerns over occupational health but he was now convinced that it was part of the safety culture. For instance it fed through to ensuring that stations were safe places for passengers too.
The Processes use to operate the railway have changed too. In part this has been driven by legislation at national and EU level and partly by the disaggregating of the railway. Independent regulators and inspection organisations and the need for robust contractual arrangements create an environment of co-operation by necessity, something that had been lacking in the past.
It was expected that in the future the 'digital revolution' would continue as it gets easier and cheaper to monitor and analyse real-time operational data. The management of competencies and interfaces could also be expected to improve.
Will our railways continue to be safe? Obviously we could not be complacent. Looking to the future there were risks from the growth in traffic and concerns over the resilience of the network as a result of possible climate change. The man-machine interface had to be 'user-friendly' as more and more technology was deployed.
This was a wide-ranging talk covering not just the technology employed in the modern railway but the people systems too. It was clear that improvements in all these systems had had a cumulative effect in improving railway safety. This, of course, has been the way of the railways from the beginning, painful lessons, (eventually!), being learned and improvements made.
Are we at the irreducible minimum, all the 'big wins' having been made? Fortunately the 'digital revolution' continues to make the impossible possible at seemingly ever reducing prices. Historically our railway signalling systems were introduced because a train between stations was out of sight and could be out of mind yet now its progress and every part of it could be continuously monitored if we so chose.
Hopefully the safety that has been actively engineered into our railways will continue to produce good results but the real lesson from history is the event that "we never thought that would happen" sometimes does.
