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Rail bosses face grilling over Euston failures
Dick Murray and Nicholas Cecil8 Jan 2009
NETWORK Rail bosses were in the dock today over a string of failures which have brought Britain's busiest railway to its knees.
A major investigation is under way into how overhead power lines have repeatedly been brought down in the past week.
There was still chaos today as Virgin Trains cancelled services to and from Euston in the aftermath of yesterday's fiasco, which saw 100,000 people delayed or stranded.
The chairman of the influential Commons Transport Select Committee said she would consider holding an inquiry into the failings, which came just after the £9 billion publicly-funded upgrade of the line was completed.
Louise Ellman MP condemned NR's failures as "unacceptable" and said she was keen to grill Network Rail bosses about the catalogue of problems.
"It's totally unacceptable that following the multi-billion-pound upgrade, passengers are once again left stranded," the Labour MP told the Standard.
"This seems to be a series of serious incidents with no rational explanation. The public deserves to have the answers. I will be considering asking Network Rail to give an account of themselves."
Last year NR was fined a record £14million after it left thousands of passengers stranded by botched engineering works.
Now the company could face fresh fines by the rail regulator if the power line problems are found to have been caused by work being rushed and a new timetable brought in too quickly.
Shadow transport secretary Theresa Villiers said: "If there is any truth in the claim that disruptions have been caused by rushed work by NR this would be a serious problem.
"Rail passengers need to be assured that the work they did well to complete by the December 2008 deadline has been done to the highest possible standard."
Engineers worked through the night to repair overhead cables brought down near Wembley late on Tuesday night. The power failure came after problems on the line on Tuesday at Rugby in Warwickshire and Bletchley in Buckinghamshire.
The two previous days, trains were disrupted because of engineering works at Watford Junction to repair damaged power lines. Senior rail sources told the Evening Standard that separate, unconnected faults are to blame for the incidents. One said: "If anything this makes it worse. If it were a common fault it would be easier to rectify, but if there are different reasons then it is a cause for concern and something is seriously adrift with the maintenance or inspection programme."
NR's own in-house engineers are responsible for maintenance of the overhead power cables, which are between two and four years old. The not-for-profit company has launched a detailed technical investigation into the repeated failures of the line, which business chiefs say has cost the UK economy £38 million in lost worker time and production.
Sharon Grant, chairwoman of London TravelWatch, appealed to passengers to contact the watchdog and tell how they were treated by staff.
Anthony Korn, a barrister from Chiswick, who was due to catch the 7.23am Virgin train to Birmingham for a tribunal, was caught up in delays at Euston Station.
The 53-year-old said: "I got here 45 minutes early and was told by the Virgin information desk that everything was fine, but it clearly isn't.
"It is vitally important that I get there on time. It's not good enough."
Charlie Gordon, a lawyer from Rugby, was delayed by 20 minutes on his daily commute into London on the Virgin train service.
He said: "This week has not been good. I couldn't get home on Tuesday, which was the worst day for me, but it's all getting pretty frustrating."
Reader views (12)
All these power line problems take the heat off London Midland, who for the last month have hardly run a service on time or even at all! Franchise to be lost very soon?
- Brendan Thomas, Leighton Buzzard, 09/01/2009 02:03
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Well Jaqueline it was John Major who destroyed British Rail and created Railtrack.
Network Rail had to first bring the network back to how it was pre-privatisation and as to the WCML a massive upgrade has been carried out which includes 4 tracking sections and in thory trains can run at up to 140 MPH.
As to recent incidents, surely its not Network Rails fault if planes crash onto their lines. If air fuel was properly taxed this would be less likely to happen.
- Melvyn Windebank, Canvey Island, Essex, 09/01/2009 00:10
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We have had now 10 years of chronic mis-management of the British infrastructure and nobody gets punished.
- Jacqueline, Hampstead, London, 08/01/2009 19:25
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Network Rail is even worse than Railtrack and needs to be held to account.
- Ian Lucas, Wigan,Lancs, 08/01/2009 17:54
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"makes a change from delays due to a leaf on the track"
The amusing voice of ignorance. No doubt you sit behind a desk for a living.
It is, of course, much easier to pretend a problem simply doesn't exist rather than actually do something about it.
- James, London,UK, 08/01/2009 17:41
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Ah yes. The bonuses will arrive on time at the right desks with no overhead problems.
- John Problem, Hackney Wick, London, UK, 08/01/2009 17:30
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Bring back steam locomotives and a pre-Beeching network. And Bradshaw. And proper railway companies, reponsible for both running their own track and their trains. The Major government's cock-up of a privatisation is now plain to see.
- G. Stephenson, Darlington, UK, 08/01/2009 15:50
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Pathetic, shambolic and, keeping the recent fare increases in mind, insulting to the public. If Network Rail do just walk away with a slap on the wrist and a fine, I hope it comes straight out the pockets of whoever's responsible. Still, makes a change from delays due to a leaf on the track.
- Wt Snacks, London, England, 08/01/2009 14:51
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These bosses shouldn't be facing just a grilling...they should be SACKED!...End of...
- Ali Sichilongo, London, 08/01/2009 13:43
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A 'grilling' by a Commons Select Committee, inexpert politicians without proper resources for research backup and with no meaningful sanctions avaiable to apply ; how frightening is that ? Not very.
- Peter Haldane, London, 08/01/2009 13:23
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No doubt Networtk Rail will be fined and the public will pick up the tab. Better quality work comes from those workers who are not pressurised to complete artificial deadlines created by the management bonus culture.
Stop all bonuses in the management tiers and if that is not possible let the managers face the consequences of their work by delaying the bonus award by 5 years, Any consequential failure on any part of the job should result in the total loss of that years bonus for all managers including the relivant board member, perhaps we might just see enough teamwork to ensure that everybody cares about the job first and not themselves !
- Off The Rails, London, England, 08/01/2009 12:13
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Where has the UK government been the last couple of years?! Nothing seems to work anymore in this country.
- Peteo, London, NW1, 08/01/2009 11:03
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