Barnt Green parish councillors are increasingly frustrated by the lack of progress on the long-promised lifts at the village station.
Parish clerk Tracy Bodley had received an email from Network Rail’s project manager Richard Dugdale, which she described as “mostly jargon”. She told colleagues the email said there was “uncertainty that these funds exist” and that Network Rail was “applying through the enhancement pipeline.”
Chairman Robert Cholmondeley said: “I thought we were further forward than this – the paperwork was supposedly on Grant Shapps’ desk.”
Coun Susan Whitehand commented: “They just don’t want to tell us there’s no money.”
Coun Cholmondeley added: “I’m quite worried about this – they will defer and defer, and then there won’t be enough cash in this five-year budgetary period and it will roll over to the next one. We need to do something; we’re coming to the end of the line!”
District councillor Charlie Hotham wondered if the council should “take Network Rail on, for discrimination of disabled people. We could make the threat of the small claims court – we wouldn’t win, but it would only cost £80 and would cause embarrassment.”
They agreed to seek further clarification from Mr Dugdale and, if none was forthcoming, to refer the matter to village MP Sajid Javid.