Crossrail drivers paid £25million – even though train line won’t open until 2021

IT IS Europe’s biggest infrastructure project, which has been marred by controversy due to severe delays and overspending in the billions.

Now, Crossrail has come under fire again after it was revealed that it has employed 479 train drivers at a £25million-a-year cost to the taxpayer – even though the project will not be fully open for another two years.

Hundreds of them are on annual salaries of more than £59,000.

The Elizabeth Line, stretching from Reading in the west to Shenfield, Essex, in the east was due to be opened by the Queen last December. But due to a litany of failings including delayed engineering works, the project will now not open until March 2021.

Most of the drivers were employed before the decision was made in August 2018 to delay the project, The Sunday Times reported.

Fully trained Crossrail drivers with at least a year’s experience get a salary of £59,231.

They also get a four-day week in a deal negotiated by the Associated Society of Locomotive Engineers and Firemen.

For drivers in training, salaries are much lower at £29,000. Of the 479 drivers employed only 114 – about a quarter, are in training. This comes amid a national shortage of train drivers, which has led to the cancellation of thousands of services.

Some of the Crossrail drivers are being used to test trains. The majority are working on the project’s partially open tracks on the outskirts of London.

Critics want Crossrail, and its parent organisation Transport for London, to divert trained drivers to other areas that need them.

Andy McDonald, Labour’s transport spokesman, said: ‘It’s frankly ridiculous that hundreds of staff on Crossrail who are employed yet not operational cannot provide cover for other parts of the rail network where shortages of staff exist.’

Caroline Pidgeon, Liberal Democrat deputy chairman of the London Assembly transport committee, said: ‘Crossrail’s escalating costs are already an embarrassment, without train drivers being paid for not working.’

Last week a damming report revealed that Crossrail started veering off the tracks four years ago, but bosses failed to stop it.

The report by public spending watchdog the National Audit Office said management exerted ‘little pressure on key contractors to deliver the programme efficiently’, which led to costs spiralling by up to 500 per cent.

Delays in engineering works at the start of the project meant contracts for the building of stations, tunnels and installing of signalling systems were also delayed. Last October, the Government was forced to give the project a £350million bailout.

A TfL spokesman said: ‘Drivers have to be competent and qualified for both the types of train they are driving and their specific routes, so it is usually not possible for them to be deployed to other operators and services.’

‘It’s frankly ridiculous’