THE loss of engineers from the collapsed company Railtrack is adding to delays on the region's railways, a passenger group claimed last night.

The North-East Rail Passengers Committee said many track and signal workers had left the company since it went into administration.

As a result, vital maintenance work is taking longer to complete, leading to renewed disruption for rail travellers.

The claim was backed up by newly-released figures collected on behalf of the train operating companies.

They showed that disruption caused by track and signal failures had risen by 45 per cent in the two months since the Government sent in the administrators.

Nationally, the four-weekly average of total train delays attributed to infrastructure faults was running at 3,300 hours in the week before Railtrack's demise.

By last week, the average had risen to 4,800 hours, the figures showed.

Ernie Preston, secretary of the North-East Rail Passengers Committee, said: "There has been a drain of engineers away from Railtrack since it was put into administration, which means that jobs are taking longer to get done.

"At the same time, we've noticed over the last few weeks that services are deteriorating."

Mr Preston said that less had been seen of a specially equipped train used by Railtrack to clear leaf mulch from railway lines.

He said one of the worst performing lines in the region was the Leeds-Harrogate-York route.

Railtrack said that it had no figures to suggest that a large number of staff had left the company.

A spokeswoman said that it thought perhaps only "a handful" of engineers had quit.

The general trend for disruption as a result of track and signal failures had been downards, but Railtrack usually expected delays at this time of year.

This was because of seasonal factors, such as leaves on the line and frost.

The spokeswoman said: "It is impossible to distinguish between seasonal factors and any other problems which could be causing this increase."