Grandfather Rights

class411 posted much the same answer while I was still typing

Basically, unless it's covered by legislation, it would be a question of how long the practice has gone on, and whether change to it would be to the detriment of anybody involved ie what is just & reasonable in the circumstances?

If the law does cover it, then that law would need to be changed by Parliament to alter those rights.

Specifically vide Brexit, regarding laws that the UK made in response to deciding to adopt an EU directive, then Parliament has to decide to repeal that law and replace it with new legislation as considered appropriate. That's why it will be 7-10 years before the Brexit process is completely done & dusted-not my opinion, the fact, because we have been members of the EU for over 40 years.

I know the practice and custom line in my first para would mainly revolve around Civil law, but it could involve the legislature at some point, if alterations were proposed or mooted.

Sorry I can't give you a definitive answer to what is not a silly question, and it may just be things will go on as ever they did. However, once lawyers do get involved................................

Grandfather rights occur in many situations. They are not enshrined in a general law but are commonly included in new legislation in order that people already permitted to do something before the change in rules do not have to re-qualify. So, for example, when driving tests were introduced in the 1930s, people who already had a licence did not need to take a test. (A common sense approach, otherwise there would be no-one able to be a driving test examiner!) Likewise, although it is now necessary to take an extra test to drive a vehicle with a large trailer, those like me who qualified before that change took place do not have to take the extra test, whether or not we have actually ever towed a trailer.

I first came across the term in the context of professional qualifications - in my own walk of life you used to take one exam which qualified you to work in two different fields. It is now necessary to take separate exams in each field, but those who qualified under the old rules can practice in both, without taking the extra exam. I had assumed that the term originated in the professions, and was intended to imply that eminent and highly experienced members of the professions, (who might well be grandfathers), would not be required to take the new exam - indeed they would probably be setting the questions!)

However, I understand the term was first used in the Southern States of the USA in the 1870s, when a literacy qualification was introduced into the requirements for eligibility to vote in some states (a measure intended to exclude the families of former slaves). But those whose ancestors (grandfathers) could vote before the Civil War (because they had not been slaves) were exempted from this requirement. This was a way of getting round the Fifteenth Amendment of the US Constitution (ratified in 1870) which prohibits the federal and state governments from denying a citizen the right to vote based on that citizen's "race, color, or previous condition of servitude"

Such "grandfather clauses" were soon deemed unconstitutional, (although literacy tests remained in some states as late as the 1960s) the term has stuck. Sexist the term may be, but so were the rules back in the 1870s. Women (of whatever race) did not get the vote in the USA until 1920.

In the transport context, a "grandfather clause" is a specific exemption from new rules for vehicles or practices that existed before the rule was made. Thus if a motor car was street-legal in 1916, it can usually still be driven on the public highway in 2016. Likewise, although you can no longer introduce a new railway service which would involve such a large step into the train, the existing arrangements at places like North Ealing, the top end of the Bakerloo, and the Uxbridge branch, can continue.

On National Rail, I understand new rolling stock has to be cleared for any route it is to be run on. This is necessary because train and track are owned by different legal entities and if something were to go wrong the lawyers would get busy. Existing (pre-privatisation) stock was assumed to be OK without a formal test, as it had in many cases proved itself by running on those lines without anything having gone wrong!
But I don't think they are relevant to S stock running on the Ealing and Harrow line, which is LU stock on LU track. The problem is, unlike D stock, they don't fit!

The "granny rule" in sport is different - it is the rule in certain sports (FIFA have such a rule for example) which allows a non-native of a country to nevertheless represent that country at international level if a parent or grandparent was born there.

There will be probably be a new concept of Pre-Brexit and Post-Brexit rolling stock, and Pre-Brexit and Post-Brexit stations in order to keep things simple, i.e. S-Stock would be a Pre-Brexit train, and the Class 345 will be a Post-Brexit train. For stations, it may work like this, Any station first in passenger service before Midnight on the 23rd June 2016 will be a Pre-Brexit station, anything else will be a Post-Brexit station.

In the long list of things that Parliament need to untangle from EU law, I expect that transport will be quite far down that list. "Real*" Post-Brexit rolling stock won't be a thing until the relevant bodies get around to writing a new set of standards for them, but to be quite frank, I don't see why they would want to change it. Moving our standards more into line with those of the EU works well for us as a country because it means that we can procure stock more easily and cheaply from the continental manufacturers (Siemens, CAF, Stadler) where our smaller loading gauge becomes the only major difference. But even then, there is no guarantee that it'd be a change for the better - the RSSB recently interpreted an EU TSI for electrification to mean that all 25kV OLE clearances should be much larger than they had been previously which is causing all matter of headaches for ongoing electrification schemes.

The class 345 certainly isn't a post Brexit train - the design work was finished well before the 23rd June 2016 so it still complies with EU regulations, and not least the fact that we haven't actually left yet.

*In the sense of rolling stock that hasn't been built to standards and specifications that had been set whilst still in the EU