When the buck stops nowhere
It would be easy to dismiss Saturday's accident at Chancery Lane as just a random mishap on an overstretched system which historically has a superb safety record. But that would be a mistake.
The very fact that the past record of the system is so good and that this incident has occurred during a period of great upheaval and controversy on the system, must create doubts about whether it is just ...
Rail 453: Another brick dislodged from privatisation’s wobbly edifice
No matter how much ministers and Network Rail try to play it down, the decision to take back the Reading area infrastructure contract inhouse is another irreversible step towards the unravelling of the privatised railway, contends CHRISTIAN WOLMAR.
We have reached yet another seminal moment in the history of the rail industry. Network Rail and the Government may wish to play down the decision to take the Reading area contract back ...
Armageddon approaches
Ken Livingstone’s task in selling the congestion charge to the London public makes Herod’s propaganda efforts on culling the first born look simple. The media onslaught for what is a pretty modest concept that will directly affect fewer than 1 per cent of the nation’s population is quite extraordinary. As congestion charging day, 17 February approaches, national newspapers and local TV stations are running countdowns with daily features which portray ...
Breaking the silence will halt child abuse
It is all too easy to believe that there is a paedophile on every street. The lengthy series of arrests under Operation Ore of men like Who star Pete Tonwshend who visited a paedophile web site in the US, together with the revelations about sexual abuse in the Catholic church, suggest that the phenomenon of paedophilia is more prevalent than previously thought.
Certainly, the continued revelations are of great concern but ...
Rail 452: Cowardice and lack of vision stifle hope for the railways
With the railway facing a period of almost unprecedented uncertainty as it enters 2003, CHRISTIAN WOLMAR calls on the industry and the Government to display some real courage and imagination in tackling its deep-seated problems head-on.
It is tough to have to start the New Year on a gloomy note but it is no exaggeration to say that the railway industry is in a state of crisis, probably worse than at ...
