Alastair Morton

Last updated • 3 min readFrom Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia

Appearing on television discussion After Dark "Britain - Out on a Limb?" in 1989 Alastair Morton appearing on "After Dark", 10 June 1989.jpg
Appearing on television discussion After Dark "Britain – Out on a Limb?" in 1989

Sir Robert Alastair Newton Morton (11 January 1938 – 1 September 2004) was Chief Executive of Eurotunnel and Chairman of the Strategic Rail Authority, industrialist and the last chairman of the British Railways Board.

Contents

Early life

Morton was born 11 January 1938 in Johannesburg, South Africa. [1] The son of a Scottish oil engineer father and an Afrikaner mother. Morton was educated at St John's College, Johannesburg, and Witwatersrand University, but came to Britain to read law at Worcester College, Oxford, as a De Beers scholar and remained in England for the rest of his life, although he did spend some time back in Africa and also with the World Bank in Washington. [2] He was managing director of the British National Oil Corporation 1976–80; as the managing director, he fought to resist privatisation. He was chief executive of Guinness Peat Group 1982–87 and chairman in 1987. In 1993 he chaired the United Kingdom Treasury's private finance panel, which sought private capital for transport projects.

Eurotunnel

He was appointed co-chairman of Eurotunnel in 1987, a position he would hold until 1996. The project cost more than twice its projected £4.8 billion price tag. The Conservative Government of Margaret Thatcher had insisted that the project had to pay its own way, and the UK legislation which authorised and facilitated the project contained an outright ban on any British public subsidy for the works. [3] In 1990 he became the group chief executive 1990–94.

Strategic Rail Authority

In 1999, the British deputy prime minister John Prescott MP appointed Morton to the chairmanship of the British Railways Board and, once created from February 2001, the Strategic Rail Authority, from which he resigned in October 2001 in the aftermath of the collapse of Railtrack. Morton famously coined the phrase that the aftermath of the Hatfield rail crash constituted a 'collective nervous breakdown' on the part of the British railway industry.

The Authority had been created for ambiguous political reasons, with considerable political and public expectations vested in it but without nearly the power to meet them. Relations with the Department for Transport, the Treasury and the Rail Regulator - which collectively did have the powers which Morton wanted - deteriorated quite quickly.

Towards the end of his time at the SRA, Morton was making public statements which were more and more critical of his political masters and what he saw as their intransigence in allowing him both the power and the freedom he believed he should have had. In relation to powers to hold Railtrack - the national railway infrastructure company - to account, Morton's jurisdictional skirmishes with the Rail Regulator became public after the Ladbroke Grove rail crash and Morton would never accept that the Rail Regulator and not the SRA had the right to determine what Railtrack's financial framework and settlement should be.

He summed up his objections in what became his second most memorable railway phrase - 'He who pays the piper should call the tune' - by which he meant that the SRA should set the overall level of public spending on the railways, and what was to be delivered with the cash, and the Rail Regulator should simply check that the money was efficiently used. That never happened during his tenure at the SRA, although it became reality in 2005 with the passage of the Railways Act 2005 which curtailed the power of the Office of Rail Regulation (which replaced the Rail Regulator in July 2004) in financial matters. Morton resigned in October 2001.

Private life

In 1990, he was awarded an Honorary Degree (Doctor of Laws) from the University of Bath. [4] Morton was knighted in 1992.

Later life

He was chairman of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain 1994–2004. He died on 1 September 2004 aged 66. [5]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Railtrack</span> British railway infrastructure owner and manager (1994–2002)

Railtrack was a group of companies that owned the track, signalling, tunnels, bridges, level crossings and all but a handful of the stations of the British railway system from 1994 until 2002. It was created as part of the privatisation of British Rail, listed on the London Stock Exchange, and was a constituent of the FTSE 100 Index. In 2002, after experiencing major financial difficulty, most of Railtrack's operations were transferred to the state-controlled non-profit company Network Rail. The remainder of Railtrack was renamed RT Group plc and eventually dissolved on 22 June 2010.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">High Speed 1</span> High-speed railway linking London with the Channel Tunnel

High Speed 1 (HS1), legally the Channel Tunnel Rail Link (CTRL), is a 109.9-kilometre (68.3-mile) high-speed railway linking London with the Channel Tunnel.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Network Rail</span> Rail company in the United Kingdom

Network Rail Limited is the owner and infrastructure manager of most of the railway network in Great Britain. Network Rail is a non-departmental public body of the Department for Transport with no shareholders, which reinvests its income in the railways.

The British Railways Board (BRB) was a nationalised industry in the United Kingdom that operated from 1963 to 2001. Until 1997, it was responsible for most railway services in Great Britain, trading under the brand name British Railways and, from 1965, British Rail. It did not operate railways in Northern Ireland, where railways were the responsibility of the Government of Northern Ireland.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Railways Act 1993</span> United Kingdom legislation

The Railways Act 1993 was introduced by John Major's Conservative government and passed on 5 November 1993. It provided for the restructuring of the British Railways Board (BRB), the public corporation that owned and operated the national railway system. A few residual responsibilities of the BRB remained with BRB (Residuary) Ltd.

The privatisation of British Rail was the process by which ownership and operation of the railways of Great Britain passed from government control into private hands. Begun in 1994, the process was largely completed by 1997. The deregulation of the industry was in part motivated by the enactment of EU Directive 91/440 in 1991, which aimed to create a more efficient railway network by creating greater competition.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Strategic Rail Authority</span> Former non-departmental public body for rail in the United Kingdom

The Strategic Rail Authority (SRA) was a non-departmental public body in the United Kingdom set up under the Transport Act 2000 to provide strategic direction for the railway industry. Its motto was 'Britain's railway, properly delivered'. It was abolished by the Railways Order 2006, its functions being absorbed by the Department for Transport or the Office of Rail Regulation.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Virgin CrossCountry</span> 1997–2007 UK train operating company

Virgin CrossCountry was a train operating company in the United Kingdom that operated the InterCity CrossCountry passenger franchise from January 1997 until November 2007. Along with the InterCity West Coast franchise held by a separate legal entity, the company traded under the Virgin Trains brand.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Richard Mottram</span> British civil servant

Sir Richard Clive Mottram is a former British civil servant, who retired in 2007 from his most recent senior post as Permanent Secretary, Intelligence, Security and Resilience in the Cabinet Office.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Albert Stanley, 1st Baron Ashfield</span> British-American businessperson and politician (1874–1948)

Albert Henry Stanley, 1st Baron Ashfield,, born Albert Henry Knattriess, was a British-American businessman who was managing director, then chairman of the Underground Electric Railways Company of London (UERL) from 1910 to 1933 and chairman of the London Passenger Transport Board (LPTB) from 1933 to 1947.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gerald Corbett</span> British businessman (born 1951)

Gerald Michael Nolan Corbett DL is a businessman who was the chairman of the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC). A businessman, over a long career he has been a director of thirteen public companies, seven of which he has chaired. He is formerly chairman of Segro plc, the FTSE 100 international industrial property logistics group. He chaired Britvic plc for 12 years until September 2017. Britvic plc is the international soft drink company whose brands include Robinsons squash, J2O, Tango, Fruit Shoot, Ballygowan water and is also a bottler for PepsiCo. As chairman he led the flotation of Britvic in 2005. He was chairman of Betfair plc between 2012 and 2016 when Betfair merged with Paddy Power plc to create Paddy Power Betfair.

Sir Thomas Philip Winsor is a British arbitrator and mediator, lawyer, consultant and economic regulatory professional.

The Rail Regulator was a statutory office holder, created with effect from 1 December 1993 by section 1 of the Railways Act 1993, for the independent economic regulation of the British railway industry. The Rail Regulator was in charge of an executive agency called the Office of the Rail Regulator.

John Swift KC is an English barrister and a leading authority on competition law. Born on 11 July 1940, he was called to the English bar in 1965 and took silk in 1981. He became a Bencher of the Inner Temple in 1992.

Christopher Wesley Bolt CB is a British economist and civil servant who was the non-executive chairman of the Office of Rail Regulation, the national economic and safety regulatory authority for Britain's railways.

The Director of Passenger Rail Franchising was a statutory office holder in the United Kingdom created in 1993 by the Railways Act 1993 and usually called the Franchising Director. The role lasted from 5 November 1993 until 31 January 2001. The Franchising Director was in charge of an executive agency called the Office of Passenger Rail Franchising (OPRAF). It was superseded by the Strategic Rail Authority.

BRB (Residuary) Limited (BRBR) was the successor to the British Railways Board. It was created in 2001 as a private company limited by shares, with 100% of the issued share capital owned by the Secretary of State for Transport. As part of the Public Bodies Act 2011, the company was abolished in 2013.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Passenger rail franchising in Great Britain</span> Outsourcing of rail transport

Passenger rail franchising in Great Britain is the system of contracting the operation of the passenger services on the railways of Great Britain to private companies, which has been in effect since 1996 and was greatly altered in 2020, with rail franchising being effectively abolished in May 2021.

Chris Green is a British railway manager. He has a reputation for the adoption of business-led management of passenger services both in the British Rail and privatised eras, and has been described as "the best chairman BR never had".

Sir Joseph Anthony Dwyer was a British civil engineer and businessman. He joined Wimpey in 1955 and spent 44 years with the firm, becoming chief executive officer and chairman.

References

  1. Christian Wolmar (3 September 2004). "Obituary: Sir Alastair Morton" . The Guardian . Archived from the original on 29 June 2022.
  2. Christian Wolmar (3 September 2004). "Obituary: Sir Alastair Morton" . The Guardian . Archived from the original on 29 June 2022.
  3. "Obituary: Sir Alastair Morton". TheGuardian.com . 3 September 2004.
  4. "Honorary Graduates 1989 to present". bath.ac.uk. University of Bath . Retrieved 18 February 2012.
  5. Christian Wolmar (3 September 2004). "Obituary: Sir Alastair Morton" . The Guardian . Archived from the original on 29 June 2022.
Business positions
Preceded by
Managing Director of the
British National Oil Corporation

1976–80
Succeeded by
Business positions
Preceded by
Co-chairman of the
Eurotunnel

1987–96
Succeeded by
Business positions
Preceded by Chairman of the
British Railways Board

1999–2001
Succeeded by
Position Abolished