Call off works on railways to help public, demand MPS

NETWORK Rail is under pressure to cancel planned engineering works next month ahead of the Christmas strikes.

Passengers have been warned as much as 5 per cent of the rail network will be closed for around 300 engineering projects over the festive period.

But members of the Commons Transport Committee say the disruption would be too much on top of the planned strike action. And they are raising the matter with Mark Harper, the Transport Secretary.

Greg Smith, a Conservative member of the committee, said: “I have written to the Transport Secretary urging him to work with Network Rail to cancel engineering works this December.

“On top of militant union action, the last thing rail passengers need is the endless disruption from engineering works.”

A number of key routes will be hit by £120million worth of maintenance works running from Dec 24 to Jan 2.

Around 15million rail journeys are due to be made over the festive fortnight, with many visiting loved ones for the first Christmas without Covid restrictions for three years.

Whitehall sources said that if projects were cancelled, there would in all likelihood be more disruption across months to come.

Network Rail said it was “very, very unlikely” it would postpone planned works. It pointed out that the work takes place when “passenger numbers are low, and thus cause disruption to the fewest number of people”.

♦ Striking lecturers have said they will refuse to give catch-up classes and delete online learning materials for students as they prepare for the biggest university walkout on record.

More than 70,000 lecturers and other staff across 150 universities are due to begin a three-day strike today in protest over pay, working conditions and pensions.

sir – Thanks to the rail strikes in September, I had to leave my car at Heathrow for a month and write off the rail tickets I’d booked.

With more strikes now scheduled into January (report, November 23), I have just booked the airport car park again in February, so I don’t need to spend the next three months worrying about how we are going to get there or get home if more strikes are called while we’re away. I’m not even going to bother booking rail tickets now.

Mick Lynch, the RMT general secretary, can apologise all he likes for the disruption, but it’s his members and the rail companies who will be the biggest losers while the rest of us get used to life without trains.

Guy de la Bédoyère

Welby, Lincolnshire