[Or why the 6.15 Great Western Service from Bristol to London Arrives Over an Hour Late]

This is the one some people have asked about. I saved this little gem to a folder some years back and it had no author; so if someone out there knows who wrote it ...

British Rail used to be a fact of British life. Smelly blue carriages with threadbare upholstery that chaffed like the paper in the toilets; fat black ticket-selling women; small cockney ticket-punching men; begrudging station buffets selling fairy liquid tea and blue Formica sandwiches.

British Rail was an archaic institution. I am, I tell you, old enough to remember the Oakleigh Park to Kings Cross line, where commuters were forced to sit facing one another and with doors leading to the corridor.

I am old enough to remember when there were gas-lamps in the stations and a coal fire (never lit) in the waiting room; and when there were, for reasons unfathomable, separate Men's and Women's waiting rooms.

I have, with my own eyes, seen trains powered by diesel, before the electrification of south London and can even remember when ticket offices on suburban lines were routinely manned by human persons, as opposed to ticket machines which can tell the difference between an Adult Day Return and a 1 Day Travel Pass but spit your £5.00 note out if you don't put it in at precisely the right angle.

British Rail had always been there. British Rail would always be there. Like England itself, it was a mess, but by God, it was our mess.

Norman Tebbit compared it with the Church of England. Everyone approved of it; everyone wanted it to be a great success, but no-one actually used it, if they could possibly avoid it.

British Rail no longer exists. A piece of late Thatcherite insanity de-nationalised it, split it up into several smaller, regional companies and created the charming situation where the firm which owns the actual track and signals is separate from the firm which runs the trains.

One winters evening in the early 1980s, the first snow had fallen from the sky, turning the English countryside into a crisp meringue fairyland.

Cherubic children were pelting each other with snowballs with pebbles in the middle of them. Most of the railway trains had been cancelled. This happened, and indeed happens, every year: it is a common English lament that "the slightest bit of snow brings the whole ruddy country grinding to a halt".

On this particular occasion, an unfortunate BR employee had been dragged into a TV studio. Why does this happen every year, he was asked, and why in particular, did it happen this year when you have just spent a frighteningly large amount of money on sophisticated Norwegian snow clearing equipment?

The poor bureaucrat gained immortality for himself by explaining that the Norwegian snow clearing equipment had not helped because it was the wrong kind of snow.

This changed everything in Britain. In the old days, when the 8.13 to Finsbury Park failed to arrive, a commuter would look up from his paper and scowl.

"Ruddy unions," he would say.

"Ruddy unions", his fellow-traveller would agree. "What is this country coming to?"

Last week, when the Senior Conductor told "customers" that the train was to be delayed for another 30 minutes due to points failure outside Chippenham, I found myself grinning at the person sitting next to me.

"The wrong kind of snow," she said, resignedly.

"The wrong kind of snow", I agreed, and went back to my paper. A whole state of mind has passed away forever.

I swear to God I was once told that the 7.15 Bristol to Birmingham service was departing late and would continue to lose time owing to the fact that it was the wrong sort of train.

Now the railways are modern. The new look trains all want to be aeroplanes. The big terminii have been redesigned to look like airports; with departure lounges with huge flat empty spaces surrounded by Burger Kings and Sock Shops and Ben and Jerry's kiosks. Porters' uniforms have been redesigned to look like air hostesses. You get a sort of in-flight magazine.

The little man who used to stand at the end of the platform and blow his little whistle, chuff, chuff and off we go, no longer has a flag to jiggle.

He now has one of those plastic objects looking like a table tennis bat. I cannot believe a table tennis bat is easier to jiggle than a flag. But it makes us think that he is an air traffic controller.

Trains also think they are businesses; it is an object of faith that things are better value for money if they adopt the language of a corporation. Virgin Trains no longer have guards.

A man comes over the tannoy at the beginning of the journey to announce that he is Gareth, our train manager. Not guard anymore: train manager. Seconds later Kevin, the senior steward seizes the microphone and warns us of the existence of burgers, hot and cold snacks and a wide variety of teas and coffees.

What I cannot do, unfortunately, is blame privatisation for the people whom I have to travel with. /All train passengers, other than myself, are the sorts of people whom you would happily throw off a moving train.

They listen to ratta-tatta-tatta music on their personal stereos; they eat smelly food and talk gibberish to their babies while you are trying to read the paper. They occupy the seat next to you, which you had reserved for your briefcase.

There was once a woman who sent her child to the buffet compartment to buy her a cup of one of the large range of teas coffees hot drinks and other refreshments, and on his return, discovered that the coffee had cost ninety pence.

For the next half hour she railed, nattered, nagged and complained that this was daylight robbery. This, she said, removing the cup and sipping the Kenco instant, had better be the best cup of coffee I have ever tasted in my life, and, gulping it down added "It isn't."

This was a long journey, and I knew that desperate action had to be taken about this woman. I walked to the buffet car, made a purchase of my own, and then sat down alongside the aforementioned madwoman. "At Macdonalds" I began "I think you will agree that a cup of coffee, of a rather inferior brand, can be had for 60p.

You have outrageously been charge 90p for a cup of coffee, and thus been forced to expend an extra 30p. Here," pulling it from the folds of my jacket, "is a Mars Bar, costing 30p. I am making you a gift of it. You are no longer out of pocket on the transaction. Now SHUT UP ABOUT IT, would you."

This raises the painful subject of children on trains. I am opposed to the practice of corporal punishment, and even more strongly opposed to the practice of infanticide, but what about parents who have decided to amuse their child on the long journey by giving it a plastic whistle to play with?

Great Western have recently introduced "Family Carriages". They are clearly marked by the pretty yellow stickers depicting, I think, clowns and teddy bears. At first I was hopeful. Presumably, these "Family Carriages" would function like "Smoking Carriages."

The offending item would be banned in other parts of the train. If someone with a child sat down in my compartment, I would be able to lean over and say, "Excuse me, madam. This is a no-children carriage. Please extinguish that child immediately."

But this is not the case. Children are permitted in all parts of the train. And, as far as I can see, there is nothing in the family carriage to help parents travelling with their offspring: no complementary toys or comics, no entertainer, nanny nor restraining device. The "Family Carriage" initiative does not extend beyond putting stickers on the carriages.

If you are crossing London, there are signs telling us not to eat cheeseburgers on the train because it annoys other customers; signs telling us not to turn our walkmans up too loud; signs telling us that fare dodgers are really only cheating everybody, including themselves and should own up after morning assembly, signs telling us not to give to buskers because people find them intimidating and signs telling us not to give to beggars, because many of them aren't really poor at all, but professionals, sponging off the state, when they should be out getting a job like decent folks.

The posters annoyed me so much I had to start giving to beggars and buskers again, which makes crossing London very expensive, I can tell you.

But still, it is early days yet. The railways are being run by idealists and there is coming a day when all rolling stock will be re-upholstered; when all locomotives will be repainted in the livery of the Virgin Company and when no train will ever run out of Kenco Coffee or deep filled Egg and Cucumber sandwiches. There will be no more unions, and it will always be the right type of snow.

All this is a great comfort to us as we sit in this station now, not going anywhere, due to Signal failure near Didcot Parkway.