Rail safety system faces delay

A hi-tech rail safety system that will save hundreds of lives is to be put on hold by the Strategic Rail Authority (SRA), the body that oversees Britain's railways.

The European Rail Traffic Management System, automatically stops trains that go past danger signals no matter what speed they are travelling. Costing £3.6bn, it could save 400 lives over 40 years.

The technology was recommended by the Hidden report after the 1988 Clapham disaster and by the Cullen inquiry into the Southall and Ladbroke Grove crashes. After Ladbroke Grove, deputy prime minister John Prescott pledged that "no expense would be spared" to implement it.

The SRA had promised installation of the system would begin by 2008, but is set to announce that work will not begin until at least 2010. SRA chair, Richard Bowker, said he wanted extra time to "prod the business case" for it.

Louise Christian, a solicitor who has acted for rail crash victims, said: "Yet again, it's kicked into the long grass and when we get another fatal crash caused by a train going through a red light, everyone will say why wasn't the Cullen recommendation implemented."