MPs round on rail 'chaos'

Tony Blair is personally condemned by his own MPs today for not doing enough to improve the crumbling national rail network.

The report, by the powerful allparty Commons transport committee, also tells Chancellor Gordon Brown he must stump up billions of pounds more funding to improve the network on which "the economy of the United Kingdom depends". The Treasury "must accept this reality".

The report takes a scattergun approach to all those in charge and lambasts politicians and rail chiefs alike for their repeated failures to produce a properly funded and efficient programme of improvements.

Of Mr Blair, the stinging 60-page report concludes: "It was most unfortunate that, in 1997, the Prime Minister did not give the railways the priority they required when he took office. Just about all the players in the industry have also contributed to the chaos the railways are now in."

The report highlights the Prime Minister's own admission when he told the Commons earlier this month that there are two reasons why the railways are in such a state; the first being privatisation "which is generally accepted to be a disaster" and the second is the under-investment in the industry which went on for "a considerable period" - several decades.

"Railtrack did not meet its responsibilities to maintain and develop the network, the Strategic Rail Authority (SRA) failed to provide the industry leadership expected of it; the train operating companies did not improve their services to meet the needs of their passengers," the report says.

"Both short and long- term measures must now be taken urgently to put the industry right."

However, Transport Secretary Stephen Byers is backed by the committee for his controversial decision to force Railtrack into administration. On balance, states the report, his decision "was correct. It was the failings of its own senior managers that led to Railtrack's downfall".

Even so, the committee said it was "astonished" that there were no contingency plans in place to cover Railtrack's failure to operate the network as it should have done. The MPs admit there is no easy answer to improving the network.

The report slams:

?Railtrack, for not being "up to the task" of maintaining the infrastructure, with the result that trains run late because of track and signal failures. Its record is "appalling".

?The SRA, which has failed to provide the leadership, priorities and precise timetable it should have done for implementation of improvements. Relations between the Government and the SRA "have soured to the detriment of the development of the railways".

?Funding for the SRA's 10-year plan, already much hyped by the Government, to improve the railwaysis "inadequate".

?Plans to allow a single train operator to provide services to and from certain main London termini. This could "disadvantage" commuters. And the committee finds there is no evidence that proposals to allow the train companies to operate their own tracks and signals would work.

The report goes on to demand:

?The carrot-and-stick approach to the train companies, offering much longer franchises to improve timekeeping and reliability - and much larger fines if they don't.

?An investigation of ways of building new lines alongside existing routes.

?The Government must order the SRA to provide clear direction and ensure deadlines are met "so that passengers will know when they will see improved services". The transport-committee, chaired by the forthright Labour MP Gwyneth Dunwoody and including 11 Labour members on the 17-strong panel, concludes in its investigation into "Passenger rail franchising, the future of railway infrastructure" that there is "no simple solution to the conundrum" of how to improve the railways.

The report states: "The fundamental problem is that the modernisation work requires continuing large sums of money over a period of many years." That cannot be funded from the fares paid by passengers alone.

"The Treasury must accept this reality and provide the money needed," states the report, adding: "The economy of the United Kingdom depends on an efficient railway. This will not be achieved without investment on a scale which dwarfs the figures proposed in the first 10-year plan."

Funding is set at £64billion, of which £33.5billion is from the SRA and the rest forecast, but not guaranteed, to come from the private sector.

The report recommends that in the forthcoming review of the 10-year plan, calculations are included to establish how much extra money is needed for rail investment "and that the Treasury make an unequivocal commitment to provide the necessary long-term funding".

It goes on to warn that Railtrack must be taken out of administration by October "at the very latest".

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