Rochdale fire halts trains

OVER 100 fire fighters from across Greater Manchester are at the scene of a massive blaze at an industrial unit in Rochdale.
The fire broke out on Albert Royds Street just after 1.10am on Thursday morning and three homes close to the building have been evacuated.
The unit, measuring over 100 metres, is still fully involved in fire while Albert Royds Street remains closed and will do throughout the day. A nearby railway line is also closed and is affecting services between Todmorden and Rochdale.

A spokesperson from Northern Rail has said: "Due to the line-side fire between Rochdale and Todmorden it is unsafe to run trains along this route. There will therefore be no services between these stations until at least 09:00, disupting services between Manchester Victoria and Leeds.

"Train services from Leeds will terminate at Todmorden. Train services from Manchester Victoria will terminate at Rochdale."
Replacement shuttle services are being set up as follows:

• Manchester Victoria-Rochdale in both directions – Half hourly shuttles
  

• Leeds-Todmorden in both directions.
  

Replacement buses will also run between Rochdale and Todmorden.
Fire Crews are wearing breathing apparatus and tackling the fire with jets from above to put water on to the fire from height.

A large amount of smoke can be seen in the sky above Rochdale and local people are being advised to keep doors and windows closed. 

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Danger on East Coast Mainline

RAIL UNION RMT today released a shocking new picture which shows six inches of rail head crumbled away to nothing leaving a potentially lethal gap in the track on the InterCity East Coast Mainline at Hambleton South Junction near Selby where normal running speeds are 125mph. The picture, taken last Friday (1st February), follows the publication by RMT of a similar damning photo taken at Colton Junction on the ECML just a few miles away back in December last year. 

RMT believes that due to renewals and staffing cuts, an initial crack had crumbled away to a six inch gap in the rail head over a period of two weeks in a mirror image of the incident at Colton Junction, leaving trains, passengers and staff at risk of a serious and potentially lethal incident. A train could have derailed, jumped the tracks and collided with an on-coming service. Fortunately, the gap was spotted by on-track teams and the section of track has since been replaced but it raises serious questions about the impact of wear and tear on rail infrastructure, with high-speed trains running on tracks that should have been renewed, in a climate of cuts and sub-contracting.

RMT understands that there is massive pressure to keep the ECML running from the government and the Department of Transport as they look to re-privatise the service. There are also persistent demands on Network Rail from the budget-holder, the Office of Rail Regulation, to cut back on rail renewals work despite the potentially-lethal consequences as exposed in graphic detail by RMT today.

However, pressure from RMT and a high-profile media campaign by the union, has forced RAIB (Rail Accident Investigation Branch) to now launch a full investigation into the condition of the track on the ECML, the latest shocking RMT pictures will fuel the urgency of that investigation which the union says must focus in on the impact of cuts to staffing and renewals and the consequences of sub-contracting core functions.

RMT General Secretary Bob Crow said:
'This shocking new picture highlights the reality on Britain's railways today - staffing, inspections and track renewals have been cut in the dash to save money and there is massive pressure right from the top of Government to keep services running at all costs regardless of the potential human cost. If we don’t reverse the cuts on Britain’s railways another major tragedy is inevitable.

'We are now facing exactly the same set of poisonous conditions that lead us to the Hatfield disaster and as this picture, following on from similar evidence exposed by RMT late last year, shows we are dicing with death and risking another major rail tragedy. RMT is demanding action before it is too late and the RAIB investigation must look at the poisonous impact of cuts to staffing and renewals work and the sub-contracting of jobs that should be undertaken in-house.

'RMT has made it crystal clear that we want all cuts to staffing, maintenance and renewals reversed and all track works brought back in house rather than subbed-out to contractors. The current contractor staff should be transferred over to direct Network Rail employment. We also want the pressure from the centre to run services at any costs lifted to enable safety-critical works to take place immediately.

'Finally, we want an end to the further cuts proposed by the Government in its McNulty Rail Review before we end up with another rail tragedy on Britain's tracks with ministers paraded on our screens with blood on their hands. Those ministers have to take responsibility right now for the rail scandal that is unfolding on their watch'.

Billy Goat's taste for Flowers

  
A magistrate in Australia, this week, has dismissed charges against a man fined after his goat named Gary ate flowers outside the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney.  A video online showed Gary, a white anglo-Nubian Billy Goat sporting a colourful trilby and chewing on a geranium leaf.  His owner, Comedian Jimbo Bazoobi (real name:  James Dezarnaulds), as left they both left the Sydney court room had donned a black tee-shirt with 'Goats Need Love too' on it.

The police prosecuting the case argued that Mr. Dezarnaulds had acted recklessly in letting a hungry goat graze around the city's flower beds.  The issue seems to revolve around the problem of the Billy Goat's lack of discrimination in that in his ruminations he didn't distiguish between grass and the flowers.

The magistrate, Carolyn Barkell, found that there was no evidence that the owner had set Gary to eat off the flower bed, and was totally unaware of Gary's taste for flowers.  She there ordered that the fine of A$440 (£293) that Mr. Dezarnaulds had been ordered to pay by a lower Court should not have been issued.

This case, of course, takes us back to our own famous Manchester case in the 1990s, when a herd of goats from Rochdale were rounded up by British Rail Transport police on Victoria Station in Manchester, while attempting to travel by train to join demonstration of the unemployed workers in Bolton. The goats involved included Doris, a mature Nanny Goat and veteran of several demos who died in 2003, her surviving daughter Edna, and a young Billy Goat who.  As the owner of the trio I was handcuffed and the Irishman, Sean Dempsey, who was with me soon took to his heals and scaddled.

In that particular case, as well, the magistrate in the lower Court found against me as the owner: Breach of the Peace and obstructing a police officer, I think.  This was reversed later in the Manchester Crown Court, when the Judge found that though the police had the right to remove the goats from the Bolton bound train because they were not travelling with valid tickets; the British Rail Transport police had no right to remove their owner who had a valid ticket.  Naturally, the Judge declared the goats would leave the train when their owner was removed simply because they were tethered with a chain to their owner.  Thus the police had breached the contractual right to travel of the owner; no doubt in fairness to the police at the time in the 1990s, they didn't fancy being on their own in charge of a herd of goats on Victoria Station without their owner being on hand to help.

Liverpool Transport Strike 1911

TO commemorate the two workers killed by British troops during the Liverpool transport strike on 15th, August 1911, a plaque will be unveiled by the Unite union boss, Len McCluskey, on Vauxhall Road on Saturday the 18th, August 2012.  A meeting will also be held at 10am on the Saturday in the Eldonian Village Hall on Vauxhall Road.

Following Liverpool's Bloody Sunday of 13th, August 1911, with a national rail strike spreading and dockers, seamen  and other workers locked-out, Liverpool and Britain seemed to be on the edge of chaos.  The Government mobilised 58,000 troops across the country.  In Liverpool, two workers, John Sutcliffe and Michael Prendercast, were shot dead by the army when troops opened fire in a disturbance on Vauxhall Road.

As a memorial to these two victims of the Liverpool labour movement, the North West TUC and the Casa Club have sponsored a plaque commemorating their sacrifice at the site of the shootings.

RMT response to McNulty Review

RMT General Secretary Bob Crow said:

'The inefficiencies of the UK rail system are entirely bound up with the fragmentation and profiteering of privatisation. The McNulty report tacitly accepts that but does nothing to address the issue.

'A graphic example is First Group bailing out of the Great Western franchise three years early, depriving the taxpayer of £826 million in premium payments while soaking up £140 million in government subsidy at the same time. Deal with that kind of scandal and the Government could claw back their £1 billion savings target at a stroke.

'Rail services are 30% more expensive in the UK as against comparable European operations for one, simple reason - privatisation. It’s the greed, exploitation and restrictive practices of the train operators that have led us to this situation and we will fight any attempt to shift the blame onto hardworking staff trying to provide quality services against a backdrop of increasing demand and front-line cuts.

'It’s a gross waste of time and money that Network Rail has 600 lawyers on the books doing nothing other than negotiating with the train operators on who is responsible for delays and arguing the toss between them for assorted service failures. Public ownership of an integrated rail service would put an end to that nonsense.

'RMT has said all along that sacking staff, closing ticket offices and jacking up fares, while the train operators are handed gold-plated franchises, is just an escalation of all the worst practices of privatisation and if that is the outcome of this process it will be resisted by rail unions and the travelling public alike.'