Elsenham: A bear trap in the woods known as Network Rail

A friend asked me not so long ago, ‘what past event would you want to return to and change?’ This thought flashed across my mind this morning as I jostled in a media scrum outside Basildon Magistrates Court in a sleeting Essex chill. 
  Chris Bazlinton and Reg Thompson stood amidst the jostle. Their respective daughters, Olivia, aged 14, and Charlotte, 13, were struck and fatally killed by a train at a footpath level crossing at Elsenham station in December 2005.

  Six years later, inside the tiny magistrates court, with graffiti etched on the public seats, both men strained to hear a swish Network Rail lawyer sheepishly say the UK's rail infrastructure company was pleading guilty to criminal charges of breaching health and safety law – criminal breaches that had led to the girls’ death (See London Intelligence for details). 
  The Office of Rail Regulation had brought the criminal prosecution against Network Rail.

  Behind the guilty plea lies a sordid mix of incompetence, deceit and arrogance - and a  sickening trail of 'if onlys'. 
  If only...Network Rail had acted on respective warnings issued by its own staff in 2001 and 2002 saying Elsenham’s footpath level crossing was dangerous and life-threatening. 

 If only...the company had rendered Elsenham safe – via locking gates, a footbridge and effective audible warnings - then Network Rail could’ve prevented the girls from being killed on a Saturday morning that was brightened, from all accounts, by their cheerful, youthful exuberance. Let's not forget, although this was a rural station, the London-Liverpool Street-Stansted Airport route is very busy, with some trains, including the express that killed Olivia and Charlie, roaring through at speeds up to 110mph.

  If only Network Rail managers had admitted to the existence of these prior warnings to the Rail Accident Investigation Branch...
 If only Network Rail had told the Essex Coroner, Caroline Beasley-Murray, in January 2007...
 And, if only, Network Rail had admitted responsibility for failing to act on those previous warnings, the company could at least have accorded Chris, Reg, Tina and the rest of the girls’ families the honesty and dignity they surely ought to have received.

  Instead, Network Rail treated the families to a six-year cover-up that piled frustration and outrage upon the families' already unimaginable anguish. 
 Of course, even a substantial fine won't hurt Network Rail too much. After all, this not-for-profit eats up taxpayers' money, providing handsome salaries and bonuses for its top executives whilst cutting lower grade staff and jobs and humping its massive accumulated debt back onto the public purse. 

  The new man at the top of Network Rail – chief executive David Higgins – promises to be a new broom sweeping transparency and accountability through the company. “Nothing we can say or do will lessen the pain felt by Olivia and Charlotte’s families but I have promised them we are committed to making our railways as safe as possible,” said Higgins after today’s hearing.

 Give Higgins his due. He has earned Chris Bazlinton’s confidence but is cited as saying there is no evidence the prior risk assessments and warnings were wilfully witheld.
 Chris Bazlinton told the media pack outside the court this morning: “We shall be watching closely to make sure that changes Network Rail have promised to improve level crossing safety are carried out.

  Going back to my friend's question, sadly, there’s no way anyone can go back in time and whisper a warning to the girls – ‘Be careful. That level crossing at Elsenham is like a bear trap in the woods'.
That’s how Reg Thompson once poetically yet aptly described Elsenham station.

 By failing to act on those warnings several years before Olivia and Charlotte lost their lives – and for harbouring individuals who covered up their responsibility for that tragedy – ‘a bear trap in the woods’ seems an equally apt description for Network Rail itself. 

Paul Coleman, London, January 2012
www.londonintelligence.co.uk

TSSA rail union calls for Elsenham public inquiry

The coalition government's Transport Secretary Philip Hammond is being urged this week to hold a public inquiry into why Olivia Bazlinton and Charlotte Thompson were killed by a train at the Elsenham level crossing in 2005. 

  Gerry Doherty, general secretary of the transport union TSSA, called on Hammond to act when opening the union's annual conference held in Norwich. Delegates heard Doherty speak about two crucial documents about the level crossing that have only recently 'emerged'.

   The documents show Network Rail and its predecessor, Railtrack, had received danger warnings about safety at Elsenham several years before the tragedy. An earlier fatality at the crossing had occurred in 1989.

  Mr Doherty, speaking about the inquest into the girls' deaths, said: "The inquest was a travesty because neither the coroner, the families nor the Rail Regulator were told about them. If either of these reports had been acted upon these girls would still be alive.

   The Office of Rail Regulation has reopened its inquiry into the tragedy. "We are fully co-operating," said a Network Rail spokesman.

Earlier on May 13, Network Rail, as Railtrack's successor, was fined £3 million and ordered to pay £150,000 costs following an Office of Rail Regulation prosecution for a health and safety offence which caused the deaths of seven people and many more serious injuries when a West Anglia Great Northern train derailed at Potters Bar station on 10 May, 2002. 

   Railtrack was responsible for the infrastructure - and Jarvis was the contracted maintenance firm - when the accident occurred.

   Bob Crow, general secretary of the RMT union, said: "People need to remember it was the privatised Railtrack and their contractors who were responsible...Network Rail didn't even exist when the tragedy of Potters Bar occurred...It is the directors of Railtrack and Jarvis - including Steven Norris - who should have been held personally liable...It is a scandal that those really responsible have got away with it.

   "Instead of coming out of the pockets of those actually responsible this £3m will come out of precious public Network Rail funds that could and should have been invested in improving and maintaining safety on our railways.

   "That is an appalling indictment of the way that this whole episode has been handled."

Paul Coleman, London, May 2011.

Elsenham tragedy could lead to level crossing closures

The Times today (Weds, 11 May) reports that David Higgins, the recently installed chief executive of Network Rail, has ordered measures designed to cut deaths at mainland Britain's 6,452 level crossings. 

   In an article written by transport correspondent Philip Pank, supported by a commentary by Chris Bazlinton and by an editorial, The Times reports that the deaths of teenagers Olivia Bazlinton and Charlotte Thompson at Elsenham level crossing in 2005 could lead to the closure of hundreds of level crossings.

   Higgins has promised full disclosure to the Office of Rail Regulation of all Network Rail documents that preceded the Elsenham tragedy. The families of Olivia and Charlotte discovered safety assessment documents, including one written as early as 2001, that stated the risk of disaster at Elsenham was real. 

   Chris Bazlinton, Olivia's father, highlights these series of warnings and recommendations contained in documents, which if acted upon, would almost certainly have prevented the deaths. They include:

• the 2001 expert's memo expressing the high risk of a tragedy at the crossing
• a 2002 risk assessment calling for consideration to be giving to locking the pedestrian gates when trains passed
• a report of a 'near miss' at the crossing one month before the tragedy in December 2005

These documents were never shown to the Essex coroner during the subsequent Chelmsford inquest nor were they shown to the regulator or to government rail investigators.


Paul Coleman, London, May 2011

Vital information revealed about deaths at Elsenham level crossing

"It was the kind of morning that teenagers really enjoy - a Saturday morning. Olivia Bazlinton, aged 14, and Charlotte Thompson, 13, set out for Cambridge, eager to go shopping. They walked down the road to catch a train at the railway station that sits on the fringe of the quiet village of Elsenham.

   It's believed they crossed the 'protected' level crossing and bought their tickets on the upline platform for their downline, Cambridge-bound train that was already waiting at the platform. It was just after 10.40am on Saturday, 3 December 2005.

    It seems the girls tried to cross from the upline platform back over the manned, gated, road level crossing that sits between the staggered platforms at Elsenham. They were hit by an upline through-train, a Class 158 Super Sprinter, operated by Central Trains, on its way from Birmingham New Street to Stansted Airport.

   "They are likely to have died almost instantly," said a spokesman for the Essex Ambulance Service. They had to be identified by DNA...

   "...Did Olivia and Charlotte think that a red light and an audible warning related to their downline train that was already standing at the station, not the approaching upline train that took their lives? Probably, although it's likely we will never know."

   "...Chris Bazlinton, Olivia's father...is adamant that Olivia (above, top) and Charlotte (above, below) would still be alive if the manned, gated level crossing at Elsenham had been equipped with a pedestrian gate that locks, either manually or automatically, when a train approaches.

   I investigated and wrote this story back in May 2006 for Rail Professional magazine, commissioned by Chris Randall, the magazine's editor at that time. I found the crossing highly dangerous. It was easy to see and understand why Olivia and Charlotte logically concluded they could cross back over the tracks. The girls were not reckless but rather the victims of an old level crossing that Network Rail - nor its predecessor Railtrack, for that matter - had modernised to render safe in an era of high speed rail services. (Click on link to read the original story). 

   Since then Network Rail, who are still responsible for the level crossing at Elsenham, eventually responded to a determined campaign by the girls' families by building a footbridge over the tracks at the station and by installing locking pedestrian gates. Common sense seemed to have finally prevailed, albeit too late for Olivia, Charlotte and their family and friends.

   However, earlier this week I learnt new information was coming to light that would show  Network Rail could possibly have prevented the deaths of Olivia and Charlotte. Sure enough, today (Saturday, 12 February), The Times ran Philip Pank's piece, headlined, 'Rail blunder allowed girls to die at level crossing', along with a comment piece, 'Network Failure'. The Press Association's headline is blunter; 'Network Rail accused of 'cover-up'. 

  The Times received leaked information about a Network Rail risk assessment report that recommended Elsenham's set of pedestrian wicket gates should lock automatically when a train approaches. 
   The report's key paragraph states: "Consideration should given to the practicality of incorporating the Wicket Gates into the inter-locking of Elsenham crossing controls and effectively lock them closed when trains are approaching."
  The key aspect is that this report was written in 2002, three years before the girls died. Had Network Rail implemented this recommendation, the girls would not have had access to cross back over the tracks. 
  Critically, Network Rail did not emphasise the recommendation to the two official rail industry inquiries into the disaster and, crucially, did not raise the 2002 risk assessment during the Essex Coroner's inquest in 2007. The coroner's jury was directed by Beasley-Murray to return a verdict of 'accidental death'.
  Chris Bazlinton tells me he firmly believes Network Rail deliberately withheld the information. Had the information come to light at the time, the inquiries and the outcome of the week-long inquest at Chelmsford might have been different. "I believe this goes very close to the top," says Bazlinton. "I believe it's a cover-up, absolutely."

  Network Rail deny withholding the assessment. A spokesman told Pank Network Rail would have supplied any information requested by the coroner, Caroline Beasley-Murray.     
   Of course, that begs the question, how can anyone request a piece of information if they're not told of its existence? Also, if an important piece of information is slipped into a bundle of papers without reference to its importance, does that amount to effectively withholding vital information and hence constitute a cover-up? 

  Pank's excellent piece of investigative journalism in The Times comes hard on the heels of his other story about Network Rail's other woes. It's an organisation - confirmed much by my own sources - that is deeply troubled and faces much upheaval over the next year. 
   Pank's article sheds light on Elsenham, which is perhaps the murkiest episode in Network Rail's relatively short reign as the body responsible for our railways. "Yet if there were ever an organisation that might benefit from the disinfectant of sunlight, Network Rail is surely it," says The Times editorial.
   Hopefully, Olivia and Charlotte are in a better place. Meanwhile, The Times' latest Network Rail story shows that we live in a place where accountability, integrity, respect for the rule of law and sheer common sense seems to have evaporated long ago. 
    As The Times says: "...there is now also no question that there should be a full inquiry into Network Rail's risk assessment and its handling of the accident at Elsenham in which two girls died. Justice and compassion demand no less."

Photo of Olivia courtesy of http://olivia-renee-bazlinton.gonetoosoon.org/

Photo of Charlotte: PA via BBC News

Paul Coleman, London, February 2011.