There was a 25 per cent decrease in the number of people (36) accidentally killed on railways in Britain, excluding trespassers and suicides, from April 1st 1998 to March 31st this year, according to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), in its detailed annual safety statistics bulletin published last week.
While the number of train accidents decreased by 7 per cent, there were still as many as 1,728 accidents during the period. Moreover, there were increases in the numbers of "significant train accidents, trains passing red signals, broken rails and in violence to staff".
There were as many as 104 "significant train accidents" - the ones potentially most dangerous to employees and passengers - an increase on the previous year's record low of 89. Sir Frank Davies, chairman of the Health and Safety Commission (HSC), said this was nevertheless "the second lowest figure ever recorded".
He continued: "I am sorry to report that 59 per cent of train accidents were again caused by vandalism - the same proportion as last year." Two other important safety indicators increased this year too, said the HSE: "The number of broken rails increased by 21 per cent from 801 to 973 and incidents of train drivers passing red signals increased by 8 per cent from 593 to 643."
The railway safety statistics bulletin 1998/99 includes figures for accidents to passengers; level-crossing accidents; train accidents; signals passed at danger (SPADs); broken rails; accidents caused by vandalism and violence to railway staff.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Public Enterprise confirmed that there is no similar annual publication of safety performance on Irish railways. At the moment there is "only one" railway inspecting officer "but they do plan to bring on more staff so eventually they probably would be able to do something like that", she said.
The British government recently announced that train protection systems, which apply the brakes automatically if trains pass certain red signals, would be installed by January 1st 2004. These should "reduce the risk of harm from signals passed at danger (SPADs) by about two thirds", said Sir Frank Davies. Mark 1 slam-door trains will not be allowed to run on the main railway network in Britain after December 31st 2002, unless they have been modified to improve their crash-worthiness, while even modified trains will have to be removed by December 31st 2004.
Mr Vic Coleman, chief inspector of railways for the HSE, said: "In addition to SPADs, particular areas of concern are control of contractors and asset management, where the increase in broken rails is a major worry. Inspectors have been looking at the state of track quality nationally and found that many sections of track do not comply with Railtrack standards."
"Another worrying trend is yet another increase in the number of staff assaulted at work." Some 382 railway employees were assaulted by members of the public - an increase of 14 per cent. In the Republic, the Health and Safety Authority (HSA) has a role in railway safety only with respect to the health and safety of workers, not the public. Mr John Welsby is the chief railway inspecting officer at the Department of Public Enterprise. Two more people are soon to join the unit, the first starting on September 1st. Currently, Mr Welsby single-handedly oversees the safety on railways in the Republic. While acknowledging that legislation needs to be revised, Mr Welsby believes that Iarnrod Eireann's safety record "stacked up very well compared with European neighbours". In fairness, the record of the company to an extent dictates the resources that are put into it, he says.
But Iarnrod Eireann's safety record is not made available to the public. Current legislation does not require it.
Indeed, according to Mr Ted Corcoran, manager of safety at Irish Rail, the company is not under any obligation to release that information even to the Department of Public Enterprise: "We advise them [the Department] of certain incidents that we're obliged to advise them of." These include accidents to passenger trains, such as collisions, derailments or fires. "Basically, that's it," he says, and confirms that the company is not obliged to inform even the Department of trains going through red lights. "We would have very few of them of course compared to Britain," he says.
"Thankfully you can count the number of passengers fatally injured in 10 years on one hand and you can count the number of staff fatally injured in one year on one hand. Obviously, we would like to have none."
