Er, the link you posted is only available to paying subscribers of The Times!
.Rupert Murdoch will curs e e for tdoing this but heres the article in full...
Minister of Transport in the late 1960s who quit the Commons to become chairman of British Rail
Richard Marsh was a minister in the Labour Government of Harold Wilson in the 1960s and chairman of British Rail from 1971 to 1976. After a rapid rise to ministerial and Cabinet rank he was, surprisingly, relegated to the back benches at the age of 41. He left the House of Commons in 1971 for the challenging role of chairman of the British Railways Board after which he acquired numerous company directorships, along with appointment to the chairmanship of the Newspaper Publishers’ Association.
Richard William Marsh was born in 1928, the son of a foundry worker. He was educated at Jennings School, Swindon, followed by Woolwich Polytechnic and Ruskin College, Oxford. He was an official with the National Union of Public Employees from 1951 to 1959 and a member of the clerical and administrative Whitley Council for the health service from 1953 to 1959.
Dick Marsh made a first, unsuccessful, attempt at a parliamentary career in 1951 when he contested Hertford for Labour. In 1959 he was elected for Greenwich. He made an early impact on the Commons. His success in the draw for Private Members’ Bills resulted in the passing of the Offices Act 1961, which extended to white-collar workers some of the legal safeguards which manual workers had long enjoyed.
As a young backbencher Marsh was regarded as a bright spark and he developed a reputation as a good speaker — lively, witty and often waspish. After a couple of parliamentary secretaryships in the mid-1960s he was appointed Minister of Power in 1966, a post in which his flair and ability soon became apparent through his promotion of the Bill renationalising the steel industry.
Exploitation of North Sea oil was another important matter for which he had ministerial responsibility and a pit closure programme cast him as one of the least favourite Labour politicians, certainly among the miners’ group of MPs.
Two years later Marsh was made Minister of Transport, inheriting from his predecessor, Barbara Castle, another troubled area of policy with a controversial Transport Bill awaiting him. Ports nationalisation, the fitting of tachometers in lorry cabs and the setting-up of the centralised computer system for vehicle licensing at Swansea were some of the controversial matters with which he had to deal, besides the inevitable round of bus and rail strikes.
At this time Marsh was being spoken of as a future Labour prime minister and in the light of his unquestioned ability and potential it came as a surprise when, in a ministerial reshuffle in 1969, Wilson relegated him to the back benches. In the customary exchange of letters on such occasions, Marsh wrote to Wilson: “As for my return to the back benches, I enjoyed it in the past and, having got over the initial surprise of my first redundancy, I am looking forward to an active period of life back on the shop floor.” Then, in typical Marsh style, he went off to celebrate his misfortune with a party. He was noted for his humour and irreverence.
Since the death of the Labour Party leader Hugh Gaitskell in 1963, he had become increasingly concerned at the party’s slide to the Left. His demotion added to his growing disenchantment and, after a change of government in 1970, to increasing frustration as an opposition backbencher.
He left Parliament in 1971 when, during Edward Heath’s premiership, he was appointed chairman of British Rail. There, faced with rationalising the system, he said: “My responsibility is to run a business, not a social service.” He managed to sell the board’s future strategy to the unions although they had reservations about the number of job losses in the modernisation programme.
Chairmanship of a major nationalised industry presented Marsh with a challenge he relished but, having changed sides, he came to believe that politicians should resist involvement in the day-to-day running of nationalised concerns. He found continuing interference a frustrating experience In l975, by which time Labour was back in power, he led the chairmen of other nationalised industries in talks with the Government to attempt to work out a new relationship with Whitehall which would reduce state intervention in their affairs. After five years as chairman he retired from the rail board, announcing that he did not wish to serve another term. Marsh was knighted in 1976, the year in which he succeeded Lord Goodman as chairman of the Newspaper Publishers’ Association (NPA). This appointment marked a departure from previous practice: he was the first chairman to come from outside the newspaper industry — even Goodman had had some newspaper experience as chairman of the Observer Trust. A previous chairman had earlier said that only a masochist could find involvement with the NPA in any way consoling. Marsh brought to it a suave efficiency, although by the time he took over it had already become a much less effective organisation than it once was.
From 1977 to 1982 Marsh was also chairman of the British Iron and Steel Consumers’ Council, an independent organisation that had been set up at the time of nationalisation to protect the interests of steel-using industries. Thus Marsh renewed an association with the steel industry started in his ministerial days.
In 1978 he announced that he would vote Conservative and became a supporter of Margaret Thatcher, who became Prime Minister in 1979. Marsh was made a life peer, Baron Marsh of Mannington in Wiltshire, in 1981 and sat on the crossbenches.
He was an amusing and friendly man — tall, athletic and youthful in appearance. He employed a technique for greeting people he had met before but couldn’t remember by asking: “So how’s the old trouble?” They always had something to say, although he was once confused when an old Cockney starting telling him about his wife.
Marsh had always mixed naturally with the wealthy and successful and found himself a congenial niche in the world of business. He amassed a clutch of directorships of companies whose interests varied from medical enterprises and technical components to the manufacture of jeans and casual wear. He acted as UK adviser to the Fujitec lift and escalator company and to Nissan, the car manufacturer, and was involved in that company’s plans to build plants in Britain. He was also one of the original investors in TV-am, the commercial breakfast television company, and in its early, troubled days in 1983 he became deputy chairman and then for a year was chairman when the original incumbent, Peter Jay, was ousted.
He published a volume of autobiography, Off the Rails, in 1978.
He was married three times. His first marriage, to Evelyn Andrews (“Andy”) — by whom he had two sons — was dissolved in 1973 after 23 years. His second wife, Caroline, died in 1975 after a car crash in Spain in which the wife of David Jacobs, the broadcaster, was also killed. Marsh and Jacobs both survived the accident. In 1979 he married Felicity, the daughter of Lord McFadzean of Kelvinside.
Lord Marsh, Labour MP for Greenwich 1959-71, and chairman of British Rail 1971-76, was born on March 14, 1928. He died on July 29, 2011, aged 83
Think he's got slightly bigger issues to worry about right now. He certainly won't offer you a job as a proofreader
