How Irish Railway Commission tried to improve how Ireland was governed and railways were regulated

What is it about?

This paper looks in detail at the work of the Irish Railway Commission 1836-39 and shows that it took a positive view of Ireland's position within the United Kingdom and tried to extend the benefits of railways to it. The aims were to create a better connection between Ireland and the rest of the UK and to address Ireland's social, economic and political deficits. The commission argued that its approach to railway building should be adopted across the whole of the UK. Its work challenged the predominant views that Ireland was a 'problem' and that railways should be developed through unfettered private investment. That was ultimately its undoing.

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Why is it important?

It is important because it shows that there was a positive effort to understand Ireland and tackle important Irish issues by the British government before the Great Famine of the 1840s. The forces that defeated it were those that saw Ireland's position as subservient to the rest of the UK- as a provider of cheap food rather than as a country with a developing economy. The same forces also advocated a laissez-faire approach to railway development, in contrast to that of the Commission, and ensured that there was no serious challenge to that approach in Britain and Ireland for the remainder of the nineteenth century.

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