Railtrack plc

Chairman announced for railway safety
_______________________________________________________________

date 22 May 2000
source Railtrack plc
type Press release

Davies CBE FREng FRS as non executive Chairman of Railway Safety - the new company that will take over the industry role for safety and standards for the Railway Group.

Railway Safety - an independent subsidiary of Railtrack Group PLC - is being set up ready for full legal establishment of the company in the autumn. It will then take over in full when necessary modifications to Railtrack's Network Licence have been made by the Rail Regulator and new Railways (Safety Case) Regulations are in place to enable the new company to assume S&SD's responsibilities.

The move follows a DETR report in February 2000 which recommended that a separate Railtrack subsidiary company be set up to look after safety and standards within the Railway Group, which includes Railtrack PLC, train operating companies and contractors.The action is aimed at further increasing the visibility of the separation between S&SD's role and Railtrack's commercial functions.

In order to ensure further transparency Railway Safety is being constituted as a separate subsidiary with no commercial responsibilities for or within Railtrack PLC. The company will be located in a separate building.

Further non-executive directors, independent of Railtrack, but in some cases representing other industry parties, will be appointed following consultation later in the year. They will make up the majority of the board of the new company.

Three key members of the existing S&SD staff have been appointed as executive directors. They are Rod Muttram, current Director, Safety and Standards; Aidan Nelson, currently Deputy Director, Safety and Standards; and Dr Matt Walter, currently Controller, Safety Management Systems.

Sir David Davies CBE FREng FRS has been President of the Royal Academy of Engineering since June 1996. He was formerly Chief Scientific Adviser to the Ministry of Defence from 1993-1999. He produced a report on train protection systems for the railway in February 2000 which was commissioned by the Deputy Prime Minister following the Ladbroke Grove accident.

Under the rules on the acceptance of outside appointments by Crown servants, Sir David Davies applied for permission to accept this appointment. The Prime Minister, on the advice of the Advisory Committee on Business Appointments, approved the application unconditionally.

Railtrack Chairman Sir Philip Beck said: 'Railtrack's Safety and Standards Directorate has worked independently of the company's commercial considerations however we hope this move will make the separation even more visible.'

Notes to Editors: Railway Group consists of Railtrack, train operating companies, contractor companies and infrastructure maintenance companies.

Biographies of Sir David Davies, Rod Muttram, Aidan Nelson and Dr Matt Walter are attached.

Biography

Sir David Davies CBE FREng FRS

Sir David Davies has been President of The Royal Academy of Engineering since June 1996. He was formerly Chief Scientific Adviser to the Ministry of Defence from 1993-1999. He was born in 1935 in Cardiff and educated at the University of Birmingham, from where he graduated in electrical engineering and subsequently undertook research for a PhD. He joined the staff at Birmingham University and during part of that period held a part-time post as Senior Principal Scientific Officer at the Royal Radar Establishment, Malvern, via a staff interchange scheme. In 1971 he was appointed Professor Electrical Engineering at University College London, where he also served as Vice-Provost for two years. In 1988 he became Vice-Chancellor at Loughborough University of Technology until he moved to the MoD. He was elected to The Royal Academy of Engineering in 1979 and to the Royal Society in 1984. He was awarded a CBE in 1986 and appointed Knight Bachelor in 1994. Sir David was President of the Institution of Electrical Engineers in 1994/5. He was elected Vice-President of The Royal Academy of Engineering in July 1995 and President in July 1996 for a 5 year term. He also held the Presidency of the International Council of Academies of Engineering and Technological Sciences during 1997-8. He has been a Council member of various bodies, including the Royal Society, the Council for National Academic Awards, the Open University and currently the University of Sussex. He has also served on various government and private sector advisory boards and committees, including the Science Inquiry Committee of the Royal Society, the BBC Engineering Advisory Committee, the British Rail Research & Technology Committee and was non executive Chairman of the Defence Evaluation and Research Agency from 1998-2000. He is a non executive Director of ERA Technology, Chairman of the MOD Nuclear Research Advisory Council and a member of the Strategy Board of the Virtual University created by BAe Systems. In October 1999 he was asked by the Deputy Prime Minister to produce a report on Automatic Train Protection for the railway which was published in February 2000. Sir David has researched and published in the fields of antenna arrays, radar systems, signal processing and optical fibre sensors. He received the Rank Prize for Optoelectronics in 1984 and the Faraday Medal of the IEE in 1987. He has received honorary degrees from several universities. He married his second wife, who is a chartered surveyor, in November 1992, and has two sons and a daughter.

Biography

Rod Muttram

Rod Muttram is Director, Safety and Standards, Railtrack PLC and a member of the Railtrack PLC and a member of the Railtrack Group Board. He took up this post on 7 December 1997, having joined Railtrack in January 1994 as Director, Electrical Engineering and Control Systems, following a career spent in the Atomic Energy, Plastics and Defence Electronics industries. Immediately prior to joining Railtrack, he was Director and General Manager of Thorn EMI Electronics' Defence Systems Division. Mr Muttram graduated in Electronic and Electrical Engineering from the Victoria University of Manchester. He also has a Post Graduate Diploma in Management and a Higher National Certificate in Applied Physics. He is a Fellow of the Institution of Electrical Engineers and of the Institution of Railway Signal Engineers. He is also a Member of the Institute of Directors, the Chartered Institute of Transport and the Institute of Management.

Biography

Aidan Nelson

Aidan has worked in the railway industry since 1972 with first appointments in a front line 'operating' role serving as the foundation for subsequent freight and passenger business management initiatives as a precursor to his appointment as Director of Regional Railways North East. With the restructuring of the railway industry Aidan moved to Railtrack in 1993 as Director of the North East and subsequently London North Eastern Zones. Since 1996 Aidan has established Railtrack's Line Safety directorate and moved to Safety and Standards in April 1998 with responsibility for industry safety strategy and planning. He is currently Deputy Director, Safety and Standards.

Biography

Dr Matt Walter

Dr Matt Walter is a Chartered Engineer with over 25 years experience, working principally in the engineering and safety fields, in the nuclear, oil/gas, chemical and transport industries. He joined the rail industry in 1993 and played a key role in ensuring the safety arrangements for the new privatised railway industry were fit for purpose, and was responsible for managing production of Railtrack's Railway Safety Case and negotiating its acceptance with safety regulator HMRI. After transferring to Railtrack Dr Walter headed up the Safety Standards Department in Railtrack's Safety and Standards Directorate (S&SD) between February 1996 and February 1998. Since 1998 Dr Walter has been responsible for the Safety Management Systems Department, S&SD, and in this capacity he is responsible for ensuring the safety arrangements of all members of the Railway Group.

Railhub Archive ::: 2000-05-22 RTK-001