David Allen interviewed by Richard Spoors

Interview with David Allen conducted by Richard Spoors on the 26th of January 2022. Duration 1 hr 49min 45 sec. Early Life; early career; Career in the civil Service; Training with the Ministry of Defence; Costing and Budgetary work; Joins British rail as a Computer Auditor; Training as a Systems Analyst; Moved to Doncaster as Divisional Finance Officer in the Operating Division of the eastern Region; Divisional Finance office structure; meeting Bob Reid; new Role as British railways Board presenter at finance courses; Lecturer at business schools; Government/railway relationships; Public sector Obligation Grant; external financing limits; cost analysis and control; sectorisation; Railtrack; Transmark position in Botswana for 14 months; Role as Corporate Budgets officer in London for all things non-rail; non rail businesses sold off in 1980s; sale of BRB property; Sectorisation and the future of privatisation; development of incremental cost analysis; Director is Finance at Railtrack; development of Railtrack accounting system; problems; Retirement in 1996; Railtrack’s business ethos; Pension Funds; Reflection and conclusion

One of over 150 oral history recordings made as part of the Britain’s Railways All Change (BRAC) archive project. BRAC was set-up to cover gaps in documenting the railway privatisation process in the United Kingdom, between 1994 and 1997, when the government-owned British Rail was dismantled into over 100 privately-owned companies. The interviews capture the recollections of people involved in the planning and implementation of the privatisation process, the management of change and running the railway during privatisation.