SIGNIFICANT SHORTS : Passenger group blames state of Rail line

The poor state of the West Coast Main Line - scene of last week's Watford train crash - has been blamed by a passenger group for appalling standards of reliability. The North-western Rail Users Consultative Committee (RUCC) said the line failed to achieve the Passengers' Charter target of 90 per cent of arrivals on time or within 10 minutes, and sometimes sank to only 60 per cent punctuality.

It blamed the continuing need for renewal and modernisation of the track and signalling for many of the problems. Despite promises of investment, the plan "seems to have been slowed by the privatisation process". The criticism comes just days after the crash at Watford, in which one woman was killed and 60 people injured. Louise Jury