Cable Theft on the Railway
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House of Commons Transport Committee Cable theft on the railway Fourteenth Report of Session 2010– 12 Volume II Additional written evidence Ordered by the House of Commons to be published 24 January 2012 Published on 26 January 2012 by authority of the House of Commons London: The Stationery Office Limited The Transport Committee The Transport Committee is appointed by the House of Commons to examine the expenditure, administration, and policy of the Department for Transport and its Associate Public Bodies. Current membership Mrs Louise Ellman (Labour/Co-operative, Liverpool Riverside) (Chair) Steve Baker (Conservative, Wycombe) Jim Dobbin (Labour/Co-operative, Heywood and Middleton) Mr Tom Harris (Labour, Glasgow South) Julie Hilling (Labour, Bolton West) Kwasi Kwarteng (Conservative, Spelthorne) Mr John Leech (Liberal Democrat, Manchester Withington) Paul Maynard (Conservative, Blackpool North and Cleveleys) Iain Stewart (Conservative, Milton Keynes South) Graham Stringer (Labour, Blackley and Broughton) Julian Sturdy (Conservative, York Outer) The following were also members of the committee during the Parliament. Angie Bray (Conservative, Ealing Central and Acton) Lilian Greenwood (Labour, Nottingham South) Kelvin Hopkins (Labour, Luton North) Gavin Shuker (Labour/Co-operative, Luton South) Angela Smith (Labour, Penistone and Stocksbridge) Powers The committee is one of the departmental select committees, the powers of which are set out in House of Commons Standing Orders, principally in SO No 152. These are available on the internet via www.parliament.uk. Publication The Reports and evidence of the Committee are published by The Stationery Office by Order of the House. All publications of the Committee (including press notices) are on the internet at http://www.parliament.uk/transcom. A list of Reports of the Committee in the present Parliament is at the back of this volume. The Reports of the Committee, the formal minutes relating to that report, oral evidence taken and some or all written evidence are available in a printed volume. Additional written evidence may be published on the internet only. Committee staff The current staff of the Committee are Mark Egan (Clerk), Jessica Montgomery (Second Clerk), David Davies (Committee Specialist), Tony Catinella (Senior Committee Assistant), Edward Faulkner (Committee Assistant), Stewart McIlvenna (Committee Support Assistant) and Hannah Pearce (Media Officer). Contacts All correspondence should be addressed to the Clerk of the Transport Committee, House of Commons, 7 Millbank, London SW1P 3JA. The telephone number for general enquiries is 020 7219 6263; the Committee’s email address is [email protected] List of additional written evidence Page 1 Freight Transport Association Ev w1 2 First Great Western Ev w2 3 Virgin Trains Ev w3, Ev w4 4 Freightliner Group Ltd Ev w5 5 Nexus Ev w5 6 Northern Rail Ev w6 7 Metro Ev w7 8 Merseytravel Ev w9 9 Passenger Focus Ev w10 10 Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) Ev w12 11 South West Trains Ev w18 12 Greater London Authority Ev w19 13 Office of Rail Regulation Ev w21 cobber Pack: U PL: CWE1 [SO] Processed: [25-01-2012 13:52] Job: 017856 Unit: PG01 Transport Committee: Evidence Ev w1 Written evidence Written evidence from the Freight Transport Association (CTR 01) The Freight Transport Association is one of Britain’s largest trade associations, and uniquely provides a voice for the whole of the UK’s logistics sector. Its role, on behalf of over 14,000 members, is to enhance the safety, efficiency and sustainability of freight movement across the supply chain, regardless of transport mode. FTA members operate over 200,000 goods vehicles—almost half the UK fleet—and some 1,000,000 liveried vans. In addition, they consign over 90% of the freight moved by rail and over 70% of sea and air freight. FTA works with its members to influence transport policy and decisions taken at local, national, European and global level to ensure they recognise the needs of industry’s supply chains. 1. For logistics operators, cable theft is a live issue and a costly one. Aside of the impact that these thefts have on passenger services, the impact on freight is considerable. This submission will look at the scale of the problem, how the logistics industry is having to move to counter the problem, and the impact on services of cable theft. 2. The delay caused to our member rail freight operators because of cable theft over the last year is approximately 114,000 delay minutes. That is 10.2% of delays which are attributable to Network Rail (excluding delays caused by other operators but including suicides). There has been an increase in cable thefts as the price of scrap copper has gone up. Most importantly this means a huge impact of delay and disruption to services used by our shipper members—the onward economic cost of that is harder to calculate. If rail freight is to play its full part in the supply chain, then those moving goods require confidence in their chosen method of moving goods. Delays caused by thefts make that certainty much more difficult for rail freight operators seeking to take goods off our congested roads. 3. Network Rail reports that cable theft has cost the railway as a whole £43 million in the last three years. This is at a time of economic austerity when investment is being made in the network to improve it for rail freight and make a rail a viable and economically sustainable mode in logistics supply chains. Therefore this haemorrhaging of cash due to cable theft (as well as the damage to rail’s reliability and service offering and image) is particularly galling. 4. Network Rail figures show the breakdown of cable theft incidents by route in 2010–2011 to be as follows: Route Incidents Delay Minutes Compensation Cost Anglia 74 21,055 £1,089,809 Channel Tunnel Rail Link 1 31 £7,251 East Midlands 33 11,234 £282,473 Kent 17 12,681 £417,950 London North Eastern 526 137,801 £3,531,416 London North Western 196 105,842 £2,795,811 Scotland 34 7,265 £254,825 Sussex 3 764 £30,081 Wessex 8 3,536 £140,423 Western 103 65,026 £3,587,181 5. British Transport Police’s breakdown of cable theft and arrests by force area is as follows: Area Cable Crimes Arrests London North 321 112 London South 391 94 London Underground 123 77 North Eastern 1,184 273 North Western 273 109 Wales and Western 632 218 Scottish 192 31 Total 3116 914 6. While railway signalling is designed to “fail to safety” in the event of damaged cables and lost power supplies, cable thieves are putting their own lives at risk (and there have been recent examples of fatality by thieves) and tampering with railway signalling is still a fundamental interference with safety of the line that could potentially have disastrous fatal results. 7. The railway industry, as with other industries that have suffered metal and theft issues such as construction plant, has invested in traceability technologies to protect its assets, such as the “smart water” forensic detection system first pioneered in the Cash—in -Transit sector. Better CCTV and lighting and fencing at rail infrastructure upgrade sites can be deployed but it is difficult to protect hundreds of miles of railway line. What is needed is a levelling of the playing field to make it harder for the metal thieves to trade. cobber Pack: U PL: CWE1 [E] Processed: [25-01-2012 13:52] Job: 017856 Unit: PG01 Ev w2 Transport Committee: Evidence 8. One further issue is the cashless Scrap Metal Trade. FTA is supporting calls for amendment to the Scrap Metal Merchants Act 1964. Due to a significant rise in value, metal has become a much sought after commodity. This increased demand has resulted in a sharp rise in metal theft nationally. Theft of signalling cable on the railway causes delays to train services, including freight services with the number of delays having grown considerably over the last two years as the price of copper has increased. 9. Historically, the scrap metal trade has been a “cash in hand” industry. This creates difficulties as there is no audit trail, making identification of individuals who may be trading stolen metal or who may be committing tax or benefits fraud, a difficult proposition for criminal investigators. A petition on the Government’s ePetition website http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/406 is calling for an amendment to the Scrap Metal Merchants Act 1964 to prohibit cash transactions which would make payment by cheque or directly into a bank account mandatory; the author of the petition asserts that the creation of such an audit trail would be a significant component in reducing metal theft. 27 October 2011 Written evidence from First Great Western (CTR 02) The impact of cable theft on First Great Western’s business over the last three years shows a significant increase in incidents, with the length of delays and cancellations also worsening. Number of Incidents Delay Minutes Number of Cancellations 2009 61 4416 13 2010 88 18864 168 2011 (to date) 117 26871 381 The number of incidents this year looks set to double the level incurred in 2009. In the same period delay minutes have increased six fold, and cancellations are twenty nine times greater than they were just two years ago. This is despite successful prosecutions and covert operations. The affect of individual incidents can vary considerably. In March a cable theft at Moreton-in-Marsh caused a total of 81 minutes of delay, affecting 20 trains. A few days earlier a cable theft at Gloucester caused a total of 1443 minutes of delay with 22 trains cancelled and 130 delayed.