Coroner hits out over Metro's 999 rules

A coroner has labelled procedures which stopped a tram driver from calling 999 after striking a Wolverhampton police worker as "hopeless".

Sherman Porter, whose Midland Metro struck Cheryl Flanagan at The Crescent stop, said protocol dictated that his "first port of call" after any incident was to contact his controllers.

Yesterday, Midland Metro admitted that it was "unfair" to expect a shocked driver to call 999 after an accident, and said that procedures had now changed.

Miss Flanagan, aged 30, died after she was struck by the Birmingham-bound tram at 11pm on December 12, 2003.

The inquest in Stourport heard from Mr Porter, who said he initially thought he had run over a sandbag and realised he had hit a person after he ran back to where she was lying.

Yesterday, Paul Bearfoot, the Midland Metro duty manager on the night, said procedure at the time meant that tram drivers were responsible for alerting controllers to the need for any emergency services to attend.

Worcestershire coroner Geraint Williams described the procedure at the time as "hopeless".

Mr Bearfoot accepted that Mr Porter would have been in shock at the time.

He accepted the coroner's suggestion that it was "unfair" to expect a traumatised driver to have to relay information on which of the emergency services were needed.

Mr Bearfoot said the procedure had now changed, and the tram company called the emergency services without waiting for the driver's instructions.

Mr Porter also denied being distracted at the time he struck Miss Flanagan, who was a data handler at Bilston Street police station and who lived with her parents in Greencroft, Bilston.

Both he and conductor Gurdev Singh Khera rejected fears from Miss Flanagan's family, raised at the inquest by their lawyer, that they had been talking to each other in breach of Midland Metro policy. David Beale, who was one of the seven or eight passengers on the tram at the time of the tragedy, told the jury that he had not seen the two staff chatting and that he himself had been talking to the conductor.

When the tram came to a halt after striking Miss Flanagan, he followed Mr Porter down the track before seeing him "recoil".

Mr Beale said: "He got back on the tram and said: 'This tram isn't going anywhere. You'll have to go and catch a bus'. So that's what we did." Mr Beale did not realise that the object was a body and made his statement a year after the tragedy after seeing a media appeal for witnesses.

The inquest continues.