The Eastern Region was a region of British Railways from 1948. The region ceased to be an operating unit in its own right in the 1980s and was wound up at the end of 1992. Together with the North Eastern Region (which it absorbed in 1967), it covered most lines of the former London and North Eastern Railway, except in Scotland.

The region was formed in at nationalisation in 1948, mostly out of the former Great Northern, Great Eastern and Great Central lines that were merged into the LNER in 1923.

Of all the "Big Four" pre-nationalisation railway companies, the LNER was most in need of significant investment. In the immediate post-war period there was a need to rebuild the destroyed stations in London and along the busy East Coast Main Line and former Great Central Railway. Additionally, the LNER had begun a suburban electrification programme which the British Transport Commission was pledged to continue. It was partially for this reason that the former LNER in England was divided into Eastern and North Eastern regions to focus investment, unlike the other English and Welsh regions that wholly took over their respective former companies' lines. In 1967 this policy was reversed and North Eastern was merged with the Eastern region.

Rodney Bickerstaffe (born 6 April 1945) has been president of the UK National Pensioners Convention and was leader of Britain's largest trade union, UNISON until 2001.

Bickerstaffe's mother was unmarried at a time when it was considered shameful to be a single mother. He lived for three years with his mother in east London in a home for unmarried mothers. He then moved to Doncaster among his extended family. He was educated at Doncaster Grammar School and in sociology at Rutherford College of Technology.

Bickerstaffe became an organiser for the National Union of Public Employees (NUPE) in 1966 in Yorkshire, rising through the ranks to be divisional officer of the northern division. He then became national officer responsible for members working in local government, universities and the water industry and in 1981 was appointed NUPE general secretary. When NUPE, COHSE and NALGO merged to create UNISON in July 1993, Bickerstaffe became associate general secretary and was elected general secretary in November 1995.

Richard Perry (born June 18, 1942) is an American music producer. Perry began as a performer in his adolescence, but shifted gears after graduating college and rose through the late 1960s and early 1970s to become a highly successful and popular record producer with over a dozen gold records to his credit by 1982. From 1978 to 1983, he ran his own record label, Planet Records, but continued after its sale to RCA as an independent producer. With hit records stretching from the 1960s through the 2000s, Perry's more successful modern releases includes albums by Rod Stewart and Carly Simon.

Born in Brooklyn, New York City, Perry came to his interest in rock music young. In 1955, at the age of 12, he attended the first of Alan Freed's live rock shows at the Paramount Theatre. He began his career in rock music as a local performer during his adolescence. After graduating from the University of Michigan, he shifted into songwriting briefly, collaborating with Kenny Vance. Perry was launched on his career as a producer, with early projects including Captain Beefheart's debut Safe as Milk and Fats Domino's Fats Is Back. In 1967, Perry moved to Los Angeles and in 1968 produced God Bless Tiny Tim, the debut album of Reprise Records artist Tiny Tim. The album was Perry's first charting hit, reaching #7 on Billboard magazine's Pop Albums chart.