British Rail staff grades

[StephenHunter]

Having just seen references to "Railman" and "Leading Railman", what were the grades that BR staff had? I know there were sleeve stripes.

 

[Andy R. A.]

Looking back at my time in the 1970s and 1980s the grades started with 'Junior Railman', normally when people joined straight from school. Then there was 'Railman', 'Leading Railman', 'Senior Railman', 'Chargeman'(Foreman). It then shifted into the Supervisory Grades, from 'A' up to 'D', later a further grade 'E' was added. From there the grading went into the lower Managerial scales starting at MS1. The coloured stripes on the sleeves started to become the norm from around 1983. One red stripe was used for Railman, two red for Leading Railman, two blue for Senior Railman, three blue for Chargeman.
Although not a definitive range of duties the Railman grades were dealing with general cleaning duties, loading/unloading, helping with the dispatch of trains.
Leading Railmen could carry out Shunting duties, and you had to be at least of Leading Railman grade to pass instructions to train crew. At smaller stations without full time clerical staff coverage they could man Ticket Offices. As you gradually got to larger stations Senior Railmen could be found acting in minor Supervisory roles as well as shunting duties as required. At smaller stations where Parcels traffic was accepted they could deal with these items as well as work in the Ticket Office. Chargemen were the old Station Foreman grade and were sometimes in charge of smaller Depots and Cleaners, they were also at certain locations be able to undertake setting up of Single Line Working when required. These are by no means 'everything' that they did. The Supervisory Grades also included Station Manager posts. You might have a Station Supervisor Grade 'C' at busy stations, while a few stations away you might have a Station Manager who was only graded below that as a Supervisor 'B'.
Clerical Grades started at 'Clerical Assistant', then Clerical Officer Grade 1, moving up to Grade 4. The Grade 2 was the most common grade working at Stations with Chief Clerks warranting a Grade 3 or 4 depending on the size of station.

As I said, this is just basic stuff and I'm sure others will be able to add to this.

 

[Lemmy99uk]

And to add to that, I think the managerial grades went up to MS5, after which you had the EGs (Executive Grades)

 

[Gloster]

Junior Railman was, I think, a bit of an outlier. It was only for sixteen to nineteen year-olds and for each year increase in age you got a slightly higher pay rate, probably something like 20 or 30p. for each year. (Riches!) There may have been some places that had designated Junior Railman’s jobs, but I think it was an opportunity to take someone on and see how they managed by giving them a variety of bits and pieces to do, normally under someone’s ‘supervision’. I started as a Junior Railman, but after a week of doing odd bits of platform work, a week’s Induction Course (I got in quickly because someone dropped out) and another week of oddments, I took over the Railman (Lampman) job. A week of training on that at Junior Railman’s rate and then I got the Railman’s rate, plus overtime on the platform at Railman’s rate. I don’t know if I was still graded as a Junior Railman, but I got Railman’s pay as I was filling a Railman’s post. Oh, happy days!

 

[WAB]

Clerical officers: CO1 to CO5
Supervisors: A to E
Controllers: Assistant, then A to D, then 4
ECROs: 1 to 7
A/ ECROs: 1 to 7
Managers: MS1 to MS5
Executive Grade: EG1 to EG4
Senior Executive: Grades SE14 to SE1

I found these in the Conditions of Service, Salaried Staff dated 1991.

I am fascinated by the sheer number of senior grades. @ChiefPlanner might you be able to shed some light on what sort of role an EG1 would be in vs an EG4 vs an SE7 (for example).

 

[GraphitProjekt]

7 levels of ECRO sounds like quite fine gradation. I think I'm right in saying that these days, different signalling panels are referred to on a grading of 1-9 for complexity/workload. Is that similar for ECRO?

 

[Rescars]

Clerical officers: CO1 to CO5
Supervisors: A to E
Controllers: Assistant, then A to D, then 4
ECROs: 1 to 7
A/ ECROs: 1 to 7
Managers: MS1 to MS5
Executive Grade: EG1 to EG4
Senior Executive: Grades SE14 to SE1

I found these in the Conditions of Service, Salaried Staff dated 1991.

I am fascinated by the sheer number of senior grades. @ChiefPlanner might you be able to shed some light on what sort of role an EG1 would be in vs an EG4 vs an SE7 (for example).

There seems to be a lot of fine calibration for Executive and Senior Executive grades. Presumably these replaced the (IIRC rather fewer) Senior Officer grades at some point. Does anyone know when this happened?

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Clerical officers: CO1 to CO5
Supervisors: A to E
Controllers: Assistant, then A to D, then 4
ECROs: 1 to 7
A/ ECROs: 1 to 7
Managers: MS1 to MS5
Executive Grade: EG1 to EG4
Senior Executive: Grades SE14 to SE1

I found these in the Conditions of Service, Salaried Staff dated 1991.

I am fascinated by the sheer number of senior grades. @ChiefPlanner might you be able to shed some light on what sort of role an EG1 would be in vs an EG4 vs an SE7 (for example).

Rather cynically , an EG1 got no overtime - though in my experience there was no appetite for paying overtime on higher MS's - there seemed to be an unwritten rule that "any other duties as required" was sort of mandatory - hence nothing for being "on call" at that level let alone for extra hours. I was expected as the Port of Felixstowe got ever busier to attend "as neccessary" (the daily train plan was continually being amended , especially as in land terminals gratefully accepted any extra business offered and offered "specials" to Control - fine - but there were then only the original terminal with 2x20 wagon crane roads , which to take specials needed full co-operation in clearing trains and somehow finding somewhere to dispose and hold the 5 sets - hence runnig extra FL ECS to say Harwich PQ , or in desperation Stowmarket and once even Diss ! - many of these "extras" of course had vulnerable loads on them so the unhappy BTP had to find warm bodies to protect them if they were not required at the port immediately. As the port had ship working all weekend , it could get fairy difficult at times - !

A nifty solution was to hire a mobile crane and divert a 20 set to Ipswich Lower Yard Goods M-F , pay overtime for a supervisor to attend and await construction of a new RCT at the being developed Walton terminal , - remember the branch was still traditionally signalled at the time and the loops could not then pass 2x20 wagon+2x37 intermediately - hence the amended bell code of 4-3-2-5 showed if it was a long train offered , but there was once or twice a "mexican standoff" ! Extra rail infrastucture certainly helped (eventually) - I think I more than earned a modest MS1 down there , but I did eventually get a bit of extra payment.

 

[Gloster]

Signalling grades by the 1980s ran from A to F. I understand that A to D were the original grades, with E being added for large power signal boxes and later F for the very large ones. This was slightly mucked up by Westbury box, the old Westbury North, which was upgraded to E after it had a panel added in addition to the lever frame following the closure of Westbury South in 1978.

Relief Signalmen were in the same step as the boxes they worked, but their rate was a bit - a very little bit - higher than regular signalmen. Relief Signalmen, both Rest Day and General Purpose, 1 worked A boxes, 2, B and 3, C. Above that it was Special Class Reliefmen, although I think the variety of their duties varied between regions: Southern men used to a lot of non-signalling jobs, including acting as station supervisors. (There was nothing that a Southern Special Class man couldn’t do!)

Many of the large panels had inbuilt relief in their rosters: as you rotated around the shifts you had weeks where you were acting as a Reliefman within the panel. Some boxes also had signalmen of lower grades, possibly Relief Signalman 2, who didn’t work the panels, but were available to go out on to the track to deal with the operation’s side of point and signal failures, etc. I have heard the latter called the ‘back row’ on the Western.

As far as I remember, the lowest step for signalmen was the equivalent of Senior Railman, so you could move up into the signalling grades from Railman or Leading Railman. Crossing-keepers were, I think, normally Leading Railman. If someone was made redundant from a box into a lower grade one or their box was downgraded, for example from a signal box to just a crossing box, they kept their old grade.

All this from the fading recollections of someone who never got above a Class B.

 

[Falcon1200]

Controllers: Assistant, then A to D, then 4

My Control career started as a Grade A, with IIRC a salary in between CO2 (which I had been before) and CO3. There were also Grade E Controllers, which I never was; I was displaced as a Grade D and returned to Control as an MS1, which the Grade E staff would not apply for as it would cost them money!

 

[Oxfordblues]

I started on 22 July1974 as a Railman* on Preston Station. There was no training, no safety-briefing and for me at least no uniform, just some spare overalls. Not even a hat! I learnt on the job, much of it shoving Brutes** around. Eventually I was moved to the Telephone Enquiry Bureau at Ladywell House as they thought I had a "posh" voice, ie no Preston accent!

* There were no Railwomen
** British Rail Universal Trolley Equipment

 

[Sir Felix Pole]

CO5 and MS5 were later 1980s inventions I think.

 

[StephenHunter]

CO5 and MS5 were later 1980s inventions I think.

Those sound like spy agencies.

 

[30907]

CO5 and MS5 were later 1980s inventions I think.

Fairly sure the Chief Clerk at Waterloo CTEB (Central Telephone Enquiry Bureau) was CO5 in 1978; Deputy CO4, Supervisors CO3 I assume as I became CO2

 

[Merle Haggard]

CO5 and MS5 were later 1980s inventions I think.

I'm not sure about MS 5 being new, but that was then to me beyond interest. At my first station, the Area Manager with masses of operating staff was MS1.

I think that Supervisor E was introduced slightly before CO5.

CO5 introduction cause real resentment amongst CO4s because before its introduction MS1 would be the grade they would apply for on promotion, but now there was another step. Most CO4s continued to apply only for MS1 vacancies. However, it benefitted me personally - I did apply for CO5 vacancies and perhaps because of lack of competition obtained one soon after their introduction. That meant, of course, that I was senior to CO4 applicants for an MS1 post. MS1 was a difficult jump not least because every year people finishing the Management Training Scheme were allocated vacant bMS1 posts reducing the number of opportunities on promotion from clerical.

Not mentioned is the re-organisation of clerical grades around 1967; previously there had been grade 5 (I think) to 1 then Speciql A and Special B. The way that the grades were aggregated resulted in a large number of CO2 posts and very few CO3 ones; working in as a CO2 in the Freight Trains Office in 1971 a CO3 became vacant. There were so many CO2 applicants that only those with more than 16 years seniority as CO2s were interviewed.

 

[LowLevel]

I've always found it fascinating how the station grades in particular consolidated into privatisation and with the loss of the mail and parcels traffic.

At age 22 I started at a medium to large principal Intercity station as a direct entry dispatcher working with an assistant dispatcher (though we actually rotated between the roles). I was in a link of 9 platform staff with 4 reliefs and a supervisor who was in charge of the station, though there was also a booking office supervisor who really looked after that side of things.

Go back 40 years and there were 10s of staff per shift, all with chargemen, supervisors and a station manager.

 

[Elecman]

I started on 22 July1974 as a Railman* on Preston Station. There was no training, no safety-briefing and for me at least no uniform, just some spare overalls. Not even a hat! I learnt on the job, much of it shoving Brutes** around. Eventually I was moved to the Telephone Enquiry Bureau at Ladywell House as they thought I had a "posh" voice, ie no Preston accent!

* There were no Railwomen
** British Rail Universal Trolley Equipment

Were you still in Preston TEB when it moved to the station itself?

 

[Roger1973]

* There were no Railwomen

I take it you mean locally?

My local station in SE London had a woman member of station staff (one of the three regulars at that station) when I first remember travelling by train and I was told that she had started on the railways during the (1939-45) war and had stayed in the job when the war ended - think she must have retired in the early 80s. (The station staff duties at a suburban London station in that era wouldn't have involved any shunting and I don't think they handled parcels much if at all.)

Presumably after the sex discrimination act came in to effect (1974?) the job must have been open to all, but I don't remember seeing many women station staff in the 80s or 90s.

Was the grade open to women applicants (apart from during wartime) before the SDA?

I understood from my mother that there were (women) attendants / cleaners in the ladies' toilets at London terminus stations - would they have been 'railman / railwoman' grade then or was it a separate grade? I vaguely remember the male equivalents in the gents' wearing the 'red sleeve stripe' uniform, before that sort of thing got outsourced.

 

[StephenHunter]

What grade would a driver start as?

 

[45Fox]

What grade would a driver start as?

Before the Traincrew Concept was implemented in October 1988 the footplate line of promotion was:

Traction Trainee (starting grade on the footplate, training as a Secondman).
Drivers Relief Assistant (passed as a Secondman but not appointed to a position in that grade).
Drivers Assistant (appointed to a Secondman position).
Relief Driver (passed to drive but not appointed to a Driver position).
Driver (appointed to a Driver position).

Not all grades were attained by everyone, a Traction Trainee might have already been appointed to a Drivers Assistant position before or whilst training, likewise a Drivers Assistant to a Drivers position before or whilst on their driving course (MP12).

These were the footplate grades from the mid 1970s (around 1975).

After the implementation of the Traincrew Concept in October 1988 the equivalent grades were:

Trainman Trainee.
Trainman (D).
Relief Driver.
Driver.
(Trainman (D) were normally passed in Guard's duties in addition to Secondman's, although there were occasionally exceptions to this dependent on local circumstances).


From the end of steam in 1968 the equivalents were:

Cleaner.
Passed Cleaner.
Secondman/Senior Secondman.*
Passed Secondman/Passed Senior Secondman.*
Driver.
(*: depending on length of service in the footplate line of promotion/in that grade).

Prior to the end of steam in 1968 the equivalents were:

Cleaner.
Passed Cleaner.
Fireman.
Passed Fireman.
Driver.
There was also a grade of Motorman, a Driver who worked electric units on mainly, I believe, the Southern Region but I understand that was consolidated with Driver in the early 1960s.

 

[Belperpete]

I'm not sure about MS 5 being new, but that was then to me beyond interest. At my first station, the Area Manager with masses of operating staff was MS1.

I think that Supervisor E was introduced slightly before CO5.

CO5 introduction cause real resentment amongst CO4s because before its introduction MS1 would be the grade they would apply for on promotion, but now there was another step. Most CO4s continued to apply only for MS1 vacancies. However, it benefitted me personally - I did apply for CO5 vacancies and perhaps because of lack of competition obtained one soon after their introduction. That meant, of course, that I was senior to CO4 applicants for an MS1 post. MS1 was a difficult jump not least because every year people finishing the Management Training Scheme were allocated vacant bMS1 posts reducing the number of opportunities on promotion from clerical.

Not mentioned is the re-organisation of clerical grades around 1967; previously there had been grade 5 (I think) to 1 then Speciql A and Special B. The way that the grades were aggregated resulted in a large number of CO2 posts and very few CO3 ones; working in as a CO2 in the Freight Trains Office in 1971 a CO3 became vacant. There were so many CO2 applicants that only those with more than 16 years seniority as CO2s were interviewed.

In the S&T, we had Junior Technical Officers, TOs and STOs. Management Trainees came in as STOs, not MS1. Each section had its senior STO, who would deputise for the MS1.

PTO grade was introduced in I think the late 1970s, Principle Technical Officer, like the CO5 being an extra grade below MS1. However, it was introduced at about the same time as a mass regrading exercise, which meant that virtually every STO in the office I worked in got regraded to either PTO or MS1. The first tranch of senior STOs got regraded to MS1, with something like two years back pay paid in one go. The following month, the second tranch of less senior STOs got regraded to PTO, again with backpay. However, that same month, those who had been regraded to MS1, got two years worth of overtime payments clawed back, resulting in many of them getting no pay whatsoever that month. MS1 grades had to work 20 hours extra unpaid in each pay period before they got any paid overtime, so those regraded to MS1 were no longer entitled to their overtime they had got paid for for the last two years, whereas those regraded to PTO got backpay on their overtime for that period! This did not go down well, as it meant what had been the senior STOs fared much worse out of it than their juniors.

As I recall, there was a considerable overlap between the PTO and even STO pay bands and those for the MS grades, resulting in many PTOs and even some STOs being entitled to MS grade travel privileges. At one stage, I was an MS1 in charge of a PTO. As my PTO was at the top of his band, I had to be given a pay differential which put me within the MS2 pay band, and so I was entitled to MS2 travel facilities. Travel facilities were determined by your grade, or equivalent pay rate.

 

[Gloster]

I take it you mean locally?

My local station in SE London had a woman member of station staff (one of the three regulars at that station) when I first remember travelling by train and I was told that she had started on the railways during the (1939-45) war and had stayed in the job when the war ended - think she must have retired in the early 80s. (The station staff duties at a suburban London station in that era wouldn't have involved any shunting and I don't think they handled parcels much if at all.)

Presumably after the sex discrimination act came in to effect (1974?) the job must have been open to all, but I don't remember seeing many women station staff in the 80s or 90s.

Was the grade open to women applicants (apart from during wartime) before the SDA?

I understood from my mother that there were (women) attendants / cleaners in the ladies' toilets at London terminus stations - would they have been 'railman / railwoman' grade then or was it a separate grade? I vaguely remember the male equivalents in the gents' wearing the 'red sleeve stripe' uniform, before that sort of thing got outsourced.

I don’t think there was any actual bar to employing women in most posts (PW and Loco may have been excluded), but right up into the eighties the attitude was that for most non-clerical jobs it was ‘a man’s job’ and not really suitable for women. There were women employed, presumably due to more enlightened, or more desperate for staff, local management; some of these would be from ‘railway families’ who it would be felt would know what was expected in the job. However, one place I worked did have a female member of yard staff and she was the biggest skiver of all.

I think that in the national level (agreements, grading, etc.) they would be referred to as Railman, etc., but locally (rosters, etc.) they are likely to be Railwoman Mrs Smith, rather than Railman Jones. Somewhere in the agreements there was a statement that all references to -man applied equally to -woman; I don’t think it actually said in a non-discriminatory manner, but that was clearly intended. I have no idea if this was there before 1974. I always use Railman, Signalman, etc., as I always have, but as far as I am concerned it applies equally either way.

 

[Belperpete]

I don’t think there was any actual bar to employing women in most posts (PW and Loco may have been excluded), but right up into the eighties the attitude was that for most non-clerical jobs it was ‘a man’s job’ and not really suitable for women. There were women employed, presumably due to more enlightened, or more desperate for staff, local management; some of these would be from ‘railway families’ who it would be felt would know what was expected in the job.

As you say, there was very much an attitude of it being a family job. I can recall one interviewer being visibly taken aback that none of my family worked on the railway. They had gone through all the standard questions to check my suitability and seemed satisfied, and answered my questions, and this seemed a throw-in question at the end to fill time. They just seemed to assume that I must have had a relative who worked for the railway, who would have recommended it to me.

A number of yards and the like, had communal toilets only for men. I can recall being told of a female graduate trainee being posted to one such yard - they had to send someone with her to stop men coming in while she was using the facilities!

Even when I retired, out of an office of about fifty people, there were only a handful of women. But that was not helped by it being an engineering department, and engineering being a difficult profession to recruit women.

 

[Falcon1200]

I don’t think there was any actual bar to employing women in most posts (PW and Loco may have been excluded), but right up into the eighties the attitude was that for most non-clerical jobs it was ‘a man’s job’ and not really suitable for women.

Even certain office roles were overwhelmingly male; When I started in Glasgow Control in 1984 there was precisely one female Controller, she later moved on and for some years the office was men-only. Which came in handy one weekend when the Gents on our floor of Buchanan House were being worked on, we simply used the Ladies instead. What state they were in on Monday morning is another thing.....

By the time I retired in 2016 things had greatly progressed and there were many female staff, in multiple roles, although still more men than women.

 

[Sir Felix Pole]

Women Crossing Keepers, of course, were a thing, usually living in the adjoining house and effectively 'on-call' for the duration of the train service. The Newquay branch in Cornwall had several well into the '70s.

 

[NeakPed]

My Control career started as a Grade A, with IIRC a salary in between CO2 (which I had been before) and CO3. There were also Grade E Controllers, which I never was; I was displaced as a Grade D and returned to Control as an MS1, which the Grade E staff would not apply for as it would cost them money!

I went from CO4 (Roster Clerk) to MS1 (Control) (both shift jobs) during OfQ. A couple of ‘shift’ E Supervisors were promoted at the same time. I benefited financially by starting with the salary as the former grade E bods, and was earning more than the incumbents in the role I was taking.

 

[Roger1973]

Before the Traincrew Concept was implemented in October 1988 the footplate line of promotion was:

Traction Trainee (starting grade on the footplate, training as a Secondman).
Drivers Relief Assistant (passed as a Secondman but not appointed to a position in that grade).
Drivers Assistant (appointed to a Secondman position).
Relief Driver (passed to drive but not appointed to a Driver position).
Driver (appointed to a Driver position).

As I said previously, I grew up in SE London where the vast majority of trains were electric multiple units, there were some diesel and electric locomotives that mostly did freight workings (and parcels a bit before the era I remember.)

Would someone have gone through this and been a traction trainee then drivers assistant at (for example) Hither Green before going driving multiple units at (again, for example) Slade Green? Were there many locomotive drivers / drivers assistants based further out in to Kent / Sussex? (I know the class 33 and 73s were all allocated to Eastleigh / Hither Green / Stewarts Lane, but realise that doesn't mean train crew would necessarily have only been based there)

But would there have been enough driver assistant jobs in the right places on the locomotive side of things to provide an adequate supply of EMU drivers?

Or was there a different line of promotion? (you mention a 'motorman' grade that was abolished in the 60s.)

I understand that on the London Underground prior to driver only trains, drivers generally started as guards then (if so inclined and passing the training) moved to driving (I have an idea there was a level similar to the 'relief driver' you mention, where someone would work as a guard or driver depending on requirements at the time, but not sure what the official title for it was) - did it work more like that on the multiple unit side of the Southern?

 

[75A]

I was on the footplate @ Brighton MT from Feb 80 to Aug 83, started as a Traction Trainee and within 6 weeks was a Drivers Assistant.
Most of our turns were on 73's, a few on 33's and the 09 Station Pilot and one with a 47 on the 'Manchester'.

 

[45Fox]

As I said previously, I grew up in SE London where the vast majority of trains were electric multiple units, there were some diesel and electric locomotives that mostly did freight workings (and parcels a bit before the era I remember.)

Would someone have gone through this and been a traction trainee then drivers assistant at (for example) Hither Green before going driving multiple units at (again, for example) Slade Green? Were there many locomotive drivers / drivers assistants based further out in to Kent / Sussex? (I know the class 33 and 73s were all allocated to Eastleigh / Hither Green / Stewarts Lane, but realise that doesn't mean train crew would necessarily have only been based there)

But would there have been enough driver assistant jobs in the right places on the locomotive side of things to provide an adequate supply of EMU drivers?

Or was there a different line of promotion? (you mention a 'motorman' grade that was abolished in the 60s.)

I understand that on the London Underground prior to driver only trains, drivers generally started as guards then (if so inclined and passing the training) moved to driving (I have an idea there was a level similar to the 'relief driver' you mention, where someone would work as a guard or driver depending on requirements at the time, but not sure what the official title for it was) - did it work more like that on the multiple unit side of the Southern?

I don't know the specific details of depots on the Southern Region but the details I posted were the footplate line of promotion grades across all the Regions of BR; promotion and transfer arrangements were on an 'all-line' basis between all the Regions, certainly since I started on the railway in 1984 & I understand for some years before. There were no separate arrangements for Southern Region EMU depots.

I do remember quite a large number of Drivers Assistants/Relief Drivers from other Regions moving to Southern Region depots to get appointed to Driver positions.

To be appointed to a Driver position you would have started in the footplate line of promotion as a Cleaner or Traction Trainee, depending on when that was.

Transfer into the line of promotion from other grades on the railway was not at all uncommon, subject to successfully passing the processes for recruitment and meeting the age requirements (usually a maximum of 23 years old on starting but sometimes Areas or Regions would vary this if they had shortages and an urgent need to recruit footplate staff).

 

[Falcon1200]

I went from CO4 (Roster Clerk) to MS1 (Control) (both shift jobs) during OfQ.

When I first became an MS1 Controller, in 1989, there was still the absurd situation in which MS staff who worked overtime, and were entitled to be paid for it, were only paid for this every 13 weeks, and the first 20 hours were not paid for at all. Which meant that if you worked a 12-hour Sunday at time and three quarters your pay for the shift was 1 hour! Presumably this dated from the time when very few MS staff, probably mostly, if not only, Controllers, were paid for overtime. Thankfully conditions did later improve.