The dataset was opened up on 1 April 2010 following support from many people, including MPs, [31] [32] and Code-Point Open can now be downloaded free with data. While the material is sound, the style is frustrating: I lost count of how many times we’re given a digressive preview of the future, e. BTC officials surveyed passenger numbers in autumn 1961, after which BR British Rail or British Railways(W) announced in January 1962 that the Branch was under review as potentially uneconomic.

Many more would follow and by the end of his tenure the country was criss-crossed with brand new roads. To be fair not all line closures were due to beeching and a good few closures were carried out due to “rationalisation” but other organisations for example the closure of the paisley cannal line and on to Bridge of weir and houston was carried out in the 80’s and made no sense what so ever. Marples was lucky not to be implicated in the Profumo Affair which rocked the Conservative Party but his political career was over soon afterwards.This file is NOT necessarily in the public domain in the United States because a non-simple image can only be in the public domain in the U. Unemployment 23 Nov 1971 But the newspaper proprietors have been saying that for a long time and they are still going down the drain in Fleet Street.

On balance, it seems that Marples was a “bit dodgy” in his business dealings and had enormous conflicts of interest as M. Car stickers began appearing with the slogan, ‘Marples Must Go’, and the slogan was daubed on an overbridge on the M1 at Luton. The next block of ten chapters explains why road and rail transport both required change by the late 1950s; how Beeching addressed these issues; and the consequential impact upon Britain’s transport system. The process used by BR British Rail or British Railways to close railways, although somewhat complex, was well established and some 3,318 miles of railway were closed between 1948 and 1962.In this role Marples inaugurated the Premium Bond scheme and set about modernising the UK’s postal service and telephone network. In anticipation of the 1962 Act, the government appointed Dr Richard Beeching as Chairman of the British Railways Board with a brief to recommend and implement such changes as were necessary to end the losses that were growing rapidly at the time. In criticising Ernest Marples, one has to explore the alternative strategies to those he utilised, and whether they were ever viable in the context of the time.

For all the façade and pretence of remaining a world power, Britain was burning its way through its finances, and Marples was limited in his resources.The Inland Revenue was demanding that he pay back nearly 30 years’ back taxes on his residence in Eccleston Street, Belgravia, London, as well as Capital Gains Tax on his properties in Kensington. The Conservatives served a full five-year term before succumbing to what many people thought was an inevitable defeat in October 1964 by a reinvigorated Labour Party, which promised a planned economy harnessing the best that new technology could offer. A major problem of Britain’s railways was the lack of electrification, an awful lot of trains in 1973 ran on diesel so would be just as vulnerable as motor transport! But with all the rumours of Marples’ shady business dealings, perhaps there was more than meets the eye to his use of a car supplied by Britain’s biggest motor manufacturer?

He would inherited the country in a much better state than he eventually did, but this year’s events had showed up his inability to manage things in a crisis. When he was made Minister of Transport in October 1959, Marples undertook to sell his shareholding in the company as he was now in clear breach of the House of Commons' rules on conflicts of interest.His subsequent report “ The Reshaping of British Railways” (commonly referred to as “Beeching’s Axe”) led to drastic cuts across the UK and the dismembering of many of Britain’s local and historic railway lines.