Train of thought
News of the shocking knife attack on passengers travelling yesterday on an LNER London-bound train had added resonance for me as it's a service I often use to visit family and friends in the North.
I've always had a soft spot for LNER, which took over as 'Operator of Last Resort' in 2018 when Virgin Trains hit the buffers after three years of having started running the East Coast franchise in 2015 as part of the Tories' disastrous rail privatisation programme. Efficiency undoubtedly suffered under Virgin - and the fact that the company has just been granted permission to operate a rival service to Eurostar on HS1 certainly doesn't inspire confidence - but the staff now transferred to LNER, unfailingly friendly and efficient throughout these commercial upheavals, are now shown not only to be dedicated but also very brave. Having handled an appalling situation, calmly and professionally by all accounts, I would hope that, as well as public recognition, they also receive some sort of award.
When I first heard about the attack yesterday evening my first thought, I frankly admit, was that this might be an act of terrorism - more specifically of Islamist-inspired terror - but the police soon issued an assurance that this was not the case. They had obviously learned the lessons of the murderous knife attack in Southport in July 2024 when disinformation and speculation on social media about the religion of the perpetrator led to riots there. They quite promptly revealed the ethnicity and nationality of the two attackers on the train as being Black British but, while this may be enough to prevent another outburst of violent Islamophobia (always assuming these men were not also Muslims) it will do little to calm racist, xenophobic and anti-immigrant rhetoric, which is on the rise following the sexual assault in Epping by an Ethiopian refugee (since deported) and a fatal stabbing in Uxbridge by an Afghan refugee.
And while the attack may not have been terrorism as technically defined it clearly will have created terror on that train, which will spill out to impact the wider travelling public. In London we have become almost inured to the possibility of attacks on public transport following the '7/7' outrages of July 2005. Imposing airport-style security in the wake of those attacks was practically unviable then and remains so now. But while the use of facial recognition technology, CCTV and possibly knife arches may increase at railway stations and on board trains, on buses it is hard to see how this could work given it is an 'open' network.
But the railway is also a significantly open network too, as evidenced by the increasing instances of trespassers on the lines bringing services to a standstill and graffiti in and on trains raising very real anxiety amongst the travelling public. Many local stations still commonly have unrestricted platform access so, for example, when I return from visiting my family and friends in the North my train journey starts at a local station with no barriers (or 'gateline') and, on arrival at the mainline station, I simply cross the platforms to join an LNER London-bound connecting service with no impediment whatsoever. Even upon arrival at King's Cross the gateline is often open, either to prevent a crush or due to staff shortages.
I wrote recently about the security enhancements being carried out to the already highly-secured Parliamentary estate at Westminster but, as Defence Secretary, John Healey, pointed out in an interview this morning, he also uses the LNER service regularly to travel to and from his constituency in Rotherham and was actually aboard a service travelling the same route a couple of hours before the train on which the attack took place. Will he and other commuting senior politicians now have to have armed security or will train guards be equipped with tasers?
Such considerations can only add significantly to the stress of daily life in modern Britain.