Can anyone tell me why British Rail became privatised?

[iSon]

I believe it's certainly the case on Central Trains and Midland Mainline that the trolley services are actually done by self employed people. Don't know if it's the same for other rail services.

You have to buy in your own stuff and effectively run the service yourself. Which is why the prices are so high. It's a bit of a vicious circle really. I used to enjoy the croissants on the Sheffield to London St Pancras Midland Mainline service when I used to travel between Leicester and Luton.

Train services round here have been a bit awful at the moment. There are no services at the weekend at all due to track upgrades between Lichfield TV and Rugby for the Virgin Trains to finally run at their full speed. Also Nuneaton station is getting it's frontage repaired and cleaned. As well as them building platform 6 and 7 ready for the high speed trains.

Also there have been no end of signalling failures at Birmingham New Street recently which have had a knock on effect along the line for local services. So a bit of a nightmareish service. I haven't caught a train in ages. It has been a bus for a good while!!

[Andrew]

I believe it's certainly the case on Central Trains and Midland Mainline that the trolley services are actually done by self employed people. Don't know if it's the same for other rail services.
!!

Yes they are. I used to feel sorry for them on Arriva Strike Days, as they'd still turn up and man the trains but they'd only be a handful of passengers on the few strike breaking services, I wonder if they got any loss of earnings payments from Arriva.