1. AN INTRODUCTION TO ENGLISH WELSH AND SCOTTISH RAILWAY

  1.1 English Welsh and Scottish Railway (EWS) is the UK's largest freight operator. It is owned by an international consortium led by Wisconsin Central Transportation Corporation which has considerable experience of reversing the decline in rail freight and owns rail operations in the United States, Canada, New Zealand and Australia.

  1.2 EWS now moves over 100 million tonnes of freight by rail every year and runs 1,100 trains a day transporting a range of goods from coal, steel, aggregates and petrochemicals to food, drink and letter mail. EWS also provides trains for the maintenance of the Railtrack network and runs more than 1,000 passenger trains each year for specialist markets. EWS owns almost 1,000 locomotives and 20,000 wagons.

  1.3 EWS employs 6,900 people, with the main concentrations being in the North, Midlands, London and South Wales.

  1.4 In the two years of its existence EWS has already committed over £600 million of investment in new equipment. Reversing the trend of the last 40 years, we are now achieving freight volume growth rates of 10 per cent each year. This will have a wider impact upon the environment and safety in the UK as rail transport is much safer than the road haulage being displaced and brings considerable environmental benefits. Rail transport is acknowledged as being significantly safer than road. In addition, research demonstrates that heavy lorries are involved in a disproportionate percentage of serious and fatal road accidents.

2. EWS APPROACH TO SAFETY

  2.1 EWS is committed to being a world leader in rail safety. Leadership and commitment throughout the company is directed to this end. There is a chain of command in which safety responsibilities are underpinned by clear policies, plans and objectives and demonstrated in practice by a focus upon what affects day-to-day safety on the operating railway.

  2.2 Standards, in accordance with the requirements of statutory regulatory bodies such as Railtrack and the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), are used to produce a practical framework for company procedures and staff competencies. The Railway Safety Case is used as a living document to monitor the effectiveness of safety standards and policies.

  2.3 Safety performance is measured and monitored. Performance is compared with previous results, international practice and Railway Group Safety Plan objectives.

  Incidents and accidents are analysed to determine underlying causes, which can then be rectified by staff training, equipment renewal or standards improvement. Over £6 million a year has been spent on improving EWS owned trackwork and new equipment has been introduced—for example hand point locks from North America are about to be trialled in EWS yards to reduce derailments caused by human error.

  Following the failure of an axle on a third-party owned wagon at Rickerscote (Staffs) in 1996, EWS has taken the lead with a reappraisal of ultrasonic axle testing and is developing magnetic particle testing as a replacement system.

  Practical improvements, such as the elimination of plain wheel bearings, improved loading and inspection of trains, the review of maintenance standards on older vehicles and concentration on personal accidents and injuries have contributed a steady improvement in safety performance. A simple example of tackling real staff safety issues in a straightforward fashion is the provision of ankle length boots to all staff at risk from slips, trips and falls rather than only concentrating upon briefing campaigns and posters. Investment in new tools and equipment to reduce hand injuries, new personal protective equipment and safety glasses has also become common place.

  2.4 A formal safety communications structure exists throughout the company allowing safety issues to be identified and resolved. The format is set by the Board of Directors Safety Committee meeting every two months. chaired by the Company Chairman and CEO and attended not only by directors and safety professionals, but also by practical railwaymen, typically a driver, a shunter and a fitter.

  This body gives direction to a structure which embraces:

Safety Review Group—Executive directors and safety professionals meeting monthly to consider performance, action plans and objectives.

Engineering Safety Group—Engineering director and senior engineers to review all safety matters relating to staff, premises, equipment and vehicles.

Operations Safety Group—Operations director and senior operators to review train operation safety issues.

Loss Control Group—To ensure lessons learnt are transferred across the company and externally and to analyse risks to the organisation and help set safety targets.

  2.5 EWS has a working interface with most other rail industry participants and this is reflected in the number of liaison groups established to manage safety across company boundaries. In addition, EWS has actively sought to support the development of safety standards and management, by nominating experienced staff to participate in industry working groups.

  The list of such groups is long, but includes:

—  Industry Safety Advisory Group (Railway Group)

—  Infrastructure Safety Liaison Group (Infrastructure Contractors, Railtrack S&SD, EWS and RT Line)

—  Operations Standards Subject Committee (Railway Group)

—  Track Safety Strategy Group (Railway Group)

—  Operations Safety Group (Railway Group)

—  Driver Management Liaison Group (Train Operators)

—  SPAD "Focus Group" and workshops (RT & Train Operators)

—  Train Protection Steering Group (Railway Group)

—  Rail Industry Advisory Committee (RIAC)—Freight sub-group (HSE, HMRI, RT S&SD, Freight Operating Companies)

—  Loading Standards Working Group (Railway Group)

—  Dangerous Goods Working Group and Incident Management Group (Railway Group)

—  Railtrack Liaison—with Lead Zone for Railway Safety Case (RT/EWS) and general safety performance issues, with individual Zones for local interface (RT/Train Operators)

—  HMRI Liaison—with Lead Principal Inspector (HMRI/EWS)

—  Train Operators Safety Liaison Group (Train Operators)

  2.6 Operations managers, responsible for day-to-day activity, are required to monitor compliance with safety standards. They are supported by occupational health and safety, technical specialists, who establish the standards to comply with regulations and undertake safety audits to ensure compliance. They are also responsible for drawing lessons from those accidents that do occur. For example, since privatisation, EWS has suffered one fatality, when a shunter was run over by the train he was shunting. This has led to a thorough reappraisal of equipment and procedures used in such circumstances.

3. CONTINUOUS IMPROVEMENT OF SAFETY IN EWS

  3.1 Investment improves safety by reducing risks from equipment. Some recent examples that directly affect safety performance include:

  3.1.1 Two hundred and eighty new locomotives, which offer much better performance and reliability leading to a reduced number of breakdowns and incidents. This will reduce the need for staff to deal with one-off situations and emergencies which carry the greatest risks because of improvised circumstances and behaviour.

  3.1.2 At least 4,500 new wagons are being introduced over the next four years. In addition many older wagons are being modified where necessary, for example to replace unreliable wheel bearings and so reduce the chance of catastrophic bearing failure. EWS inherited 1,500 wagons with plain bearings from British Rail. By 1999 these will almost all have been eliminated or replaced with modern roller bearings.

  3.1.3 Automatic couplings have been designed and are being introduced on all new wagons. These will reduce the need for staff to go between wagons to couple and uncouple trains. One feature of our business growth is that we will be running far more trains of mixed loads for different customers, requiring much more shunting and marshalling than was needed by the previous concentration upon unit trains of fixed formation.

  3.1.4 Driving standards are one of the key building blocks for rail safety. Signals passed at danger (SPADS) are the clearest manifestation of this.

  Together with other industry partners, EWS continues to research causal factors and identify practical solutions across the range of potential contributory issues, which includes:

Alertness: involving tiredness (working hours, shift and sleep patterns), job interest (type and variety of work performed), morale (industrial relations, management behaviour, job security).

Competence: fit for purpose training and continuous assessment. For example, in addition to practical assessment, we are investing in airline-style simulators which enable driving techniques to be analysed in detail and challenging situations to be created and drivers' responses monitored.

Equipment:

(i)  As far as locomotives and wagons are concerned, simultaneously both improving and standardising the effectiveness of braking systems in order to inject more predictability into driving.

(ii)  We also believe many SPADS are caused because drivers are required to contact the signalman via a special telephone on the signal post, when faced with a red signal. Even subconsciously this can encourage drivers to stop as close to the signal as possible, thereby increasing the risks of misjudgment. We believe two options are available:

(a)  locate the telephone some distance in advance of the relevant signal.

(b)  allow drivers to use their in-cab telephones to communicate with the signalman. This would bring a secondary benefit of eliminating ankle injuries sustained when climbing down from locomotive cabs and walking along the uneven ballast surface to the signal-post telephone. We are discussing with Railtrack the possibility of some trial locations for an experiment and hope to proceed in the near future.

(iii)  It is recognised that electronic data recorders (black boxes) offer invaluable potential for accident investigation and monitoring train driving performance. In addition to fitting the new fleet of Class 66 locomotives, EWS decided to fit its entire mainline diesel locomotive fleet and the programme of installation is now underway. EWS is also progressing the use of recorded data for competence assessment purposes.

(iv)  EWS positively supports the Train Protection Warning System and wishes to see it urgently progressed. We are working closely with Railtrack to develop the technical aspects associated with heavy freight operation. We support the view that it offers the potential for substantial reduction in SPAD risk.

  3.1.5 Systematic identification of hazards and improvements to operating practices are producing a falling trend in incidents involving dangerous goods, collisions and derailments both on the Railtrack network and on the 900 miles of track owned by EWS.

4. GENERAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE SAFETY REGIME

  4.1 EWS has no doubt that the highly structured safety regime the industry now employs, partly as a result of major accidents such as Clapham and partly in response to the complex matrix of the privatised railway, has been of great benefit in injecting clear frameworks and disciplines into the management of safety. Safety Case compliance, audits and risk assessments are now part of the every day activity. All industry parties, however, have a duty to ensure that the formal regime never becomes an end in itself but is used to identify and rectify real risks to safety and loss on the railway.

  4.2 Whilst EWS understands some of the concerns expressed about the position of Railtrack's Safety and Standards Directorate (S&SD) within the main body of Railtrack and supports the call for an arm's length relationship, we believe this can be achieved within the current overall structure by conferring a higher degree of independence on S&SD whilst still leaving it within the Railtrack Group. Discussions at the Industry Safety Advisory Group, of which EWS is a member, seem to be leading in the right direction with proposals for an advisory Board made up of key industry representatives.

  4.3 Historically, the response to significant accidents in respect of site investigation, recovery and internal inquiry in British Rail was conducted quickly and openly. The emphasis was on understanding causes and preventing repetition.

  Experience in the first few years of privatisation points to extended timescales in site investigation and recovery, with considerably increased (British Transport) Police and HSE involvement and an overlap between their interests and responsibilities. The threat of legal proceedings has discouraged provision of evidence in some cases.

  Whilst it is recognised that this has occurred in generally only the most serious accidents, the complex contractual regime and threat of exposure to liabilities has contributed to delays to investigation and restoration of services. There is a continuing effort to maintain a clear distinction between safety investigation of causation and the subsequent resolution of liabilities. There is a risk however that the liability chain, which stems from the multi-user, multi-party contractual relationships also discourages admission of responsibility. This was foreseen during planning for privatisation and may ultimately be an unavoidable casualty of the new industry structure. However, the industry's effort to provide independence of chairmanship for formal railway inquiries into major accidents is generally working well and continues to be supported.

  4.4 One particular area where the British railway industry compares unfavourably with other railways in developed countries, is the poor availability of modern telecommunications. EWS has equipped drivers and groundstaff with mobile telephones and would also like to increase the use of radio communication between locomotives, signalling centres, control centres and other trains on the move in the vicinity. Whilst the hardware and technology exists, there is currently an acute shortage of suitable radio channels to the rail industry. Most of the channels are understood to be held by the MoD.

  4.5 In conclusion, we believe that safety in the rail industry is now better understood and managed than ever before. The formal structures are in place, new equipment and techniques are constantly emerging and safety is recognised as an absolute prerequisite for a growing and commercially successful railway in the future. More importantly measurement of performance shows a falling trend for most of the key indicators which means real safety is improving and fewer accidents are occurring.