Desperate documentary is a disgrace to the BBC

Over the past three years, I have been phoned several times by TV documentary makers eager to uncover a story about rail safety because both the BBC and Channel 4 have been in the market for such a programme.

Indeed, there was an element of desperation about their efforts to try to show that the industry was unsafe. That desperation is well demonstrated by last night's Whistleblower programme. Because the BBC invested six months of effort, with three undercover reporters, it had to produce a film. But their pickings were thin indeed: various employees who behaved badly, such as passing off stolen credit cards and getting drunk, and there were a few stories that might have made the inside pages of regional newspaper such as sections of imperfect track and allegations about missing records.

As Network Rail admitted, the piece of track shown near Guildford is "neither pretty nor perfect" but that does not mean it poses a risk. The railway has to be maintained in a safe state, but not gold-plated. And that basic fact seems to have escaped the reporters. Moreover, the retired railwayman called upon to comment on this turns out to be a rolling stock rather than a track expert.

The BBC also alleges that information about a bad section of track had been taken off the data base after a derailment, suggesting a conspiracy. In fact, the information had been moved to another place. And so on.

Sure, a lot of the items highlighted on the film will not be sources of pride to the railway industry. There are examples of waste and sloppy management but these can be found in any large organisation.

Basically, in terms of safety, the rail industry has largely got its act together since the terrible spate of accidents between 1997 and 2002. Last year, there were a billion passenger journeys without a single death. That does not mean there will never be another train crash, accidents will always be possible when large lumps of metal are travelling at 125mph. However, the risks are very low and the BBC's film does nothing to back up its trailer which said, quite disgracefully: "If you knew what we know, would you travel by train?"

The fact is that driving is 50 times more likely to result in death than taking the train.