Ah, the white bucket brigade strikes again. Can you remove the railing? My wrought iron is attached with hex bolts. I never removed it though. I would try using paint stripper to return it to its natural wrought iron.

Thank you for your advice! I hadn’t really thought about removing it to be honest, but now that you’ve said that I’ve checked and it’s definitely been screwed in. However, they have painted so heavily you can just about see the screws on the bottom rail. The part that has been screwed into the bannister is heavily painted and to be honest looks like it has had some sort of bonding agent stuck to it as well as the screws are just big bubbles! (See attached picture) unless that is just heavily painted. I’m clueless with this sort of thing so excuse me if I’m being silly, but baring in mind we are yet to get carpets and paint the walls, is it impossible to strip it whilst it’s in position? It would I end up ruining the wood?

I enlarged your picture, I see what you mean. Looks like you even have a wooden railing. Mine is different. All wrought iron and bolted to wall and floor. Looks like all you can do is strip it in place. Which would be the best but very messy to do, repaint it or replace it.