Updating the Railway Standards Code

What is the Railway Standards Code?

The Railway Standards Code, commonly referred to as ‘the Code’, is a fundamental part of the organisational structure for standards in the GB railway. It is based upon the World Trade Organisation principles for the development of International Standards which were agreed upon by the Technical Barriers to Trade Committee in 2000. The Code is approved by the industry regulator, the Office of Rail and Road (ORR), and has been a part of how RSSB operates right from the start. ‘The Railway Standards Manual’ is its sister document and describes how the requirements of the Code are to be delivered. 

Essentially, the Code establishes the governance arrangements for creating, changing, deviating from, and publishing Railway Group Standards. It sets out how RSSB works collaboratively throughout industry on standards, and a structure for managing the standards through the standards committees. It establishes the Industry Standards Coordination Committee which is accountable to the RSSB Board for the management of the Code. It also includes a change control mechanism and the process for making appeals against decisions. Perhaps most importantly it establishes the need to operate through consensus in all standards-related activities.

So what is being updated now? 

The changes can be grouped under five objectives, some of which really do require urgent attention now while others are important but not necessarily urgent. 

Firstly, there are the changes post-EU exit. The Code references EU regulatory documents and processes such as the Interoperability Directive and Technical Specifications for Interoperability, but these no longer apply in Great Britain. Instead, it will refer to the National Technical Specification Notices which came into effect on 1 January 2021. These are published by the Secretary of State on the Department for Transport (DfT) website and allow all parts of our network to run as a whole system, providing benefits across industry. 

Secondly, the Code will recognise other RSSB technical documents such as Rail Industry Standards and help improve users’ experience of working with RSSB on deviations. For instance, there will be improved clarity about when a project needs to seek a deviation from a standard. 

The third set of improvements will provide greater clarity about how the deviations process applies to Railway Group Standards (RGS) whether they are applied as part of a licence condition or as a National Technical Rule. How the deviations process applies to RGSs is particularly important because the implications of not meeting a standard and having a deviation request declined are very different in these two conditions.

The fourth change will be to promote inclusivity by, for example, making language gender neutral throughout the document. 
The fifth change will improve readability for users as well as correcting any errors.

Improving the Code in these ways will help the industry in both the short and long-term. However, updating it isn’t automatic. Currently, RSSB is engaging stakeholders in these proposals, including the DfT and ORR. These proposed changes need to pass through robust governance processes, including ISCC, wider industry consultation, the RSSB Board, and RSSB’s AGM, before being finally approved by ORR in December 2023. 

The need for these improvements is clear and RSSB will welcome all consultation responses about them later this summer.