Railway bosses call on tough new measures on metal theft (From This Is Lancashire)

Railway bosses call on tough new measures on metal theft

6:24pm Wednesday 9th November 2011 in Leisure

RAILWAY bosses and police have called on the government to introduce tough new measures to tackle the rising number of cable thefts.

MPs heard evidence yesterday on the extent of the problem during a meeting of House of Commons Transport Committee.

They are calling for measures including a new licensing regime on scrap dealers, police powers to search and close scrap metal dealers, searchable records of sales of scrap metal and give magistrates powers to add restrictions to licences and prevent closed yards from re-opening unless conditions are met.

Last month we revealed how the theft of lead flashing, copper boilers, piping and cables from train lines has cost businesses and individuals in East Lancashire £7million in five years across the county.

The committee was told that there are as many as six to eight cable thefts every day, deterring around half a million passengers a year from using the railways.

East Lancashire has been hit by several cable thefts in recent months which has caused serious disruption to services.

Dyan Crowther, director operational services at Network Rail, said: "Britain is under attack from metal thieves.

"Every day hundreds of passengers and essential freight deliveries are being disrupted and delayed.

"We believe that the only way to significantly reduce metal crime is to take away the illegal market and that more robust legislation and police powers are needed to achieve that."

British Transport Police Deputy Chief Constable Paul Crowther said: "Metal theft, in any form, is a direct attack on our communities. When the target is the railway, the thieves are directly affecting the travelling public who use trains to go about their daily business and indirectly affecting businesses and services whose employees are delayed by the disruption."

Meanwhile, Northern Rail passengers were affected by over-running engineering works which caused disruption between Blackburn and Clitheroe yesterday.