Beeching cuts and the Cotswold Line between Oxford and Worcester has increased significantly, and double track has now been reinstated on the Golden Valley Line. The Conservatives increased their Commons majority in the general election of 8 October 1959, their first with Harold Macmillan as prime minister, who famously said that most people "had never had it so good". Ernest Marples, previously the Postmaster General, was made Transport Minister two weeks later in a cabinet reshuffle; Marples was described by some as "cocky", "flash", "slick" and as a "construction tycoon", and Macmillan noted that the Northern working-class boy who had won a
Never So Bold in most of his races by the American jockey Steve Cauthen. Never So Bold was sired by Bold Lad, the leading British and Irish two-year-old of 1966, whose other offspring included the 1000 Guineas winner Waterloo. His dam Never Never Land was an unraced sister of Bombazine, who produced the St Leger winner Bruni. Never So Bold's only race as a two-year-old came on 29 October at Newmarket Racecourse when he finished eighth of the twenty runners in a maiden race. In the following season he lost his first three races but then developed into what the independent Timeform organisation