I AM sure I am not the only person in Britain who thought I was hearing things when the solemn-voiced ITV announcer revealed that the much hyped Sunday afternoon showing of The Railway Children was being dropped from the schedules due to the "tragic events in Berkshire".

Did a group of senior television executives really gather round a table and come to the conclusion that viewers in Britain couldn't possibly cope with a children's film that featured trains after a train crash in which seven people were killed?

Am I so hard, insensitive and uncaring that I couldn't see the connection? Or is everyone else a lot more delicate, emotional, perhaps even hysterical, than I imagined?

The railways are still much safer than our roads. Many more people are killed in car accidents every day. Yet Top Gear is still shown every Sunday. And I'm sure Chitty Chitty Bang Bang will get an airing this Christmas. What happened in Berkshire was a shocking accident caused by a car parked on the rail lines. Too many commentators were, predictably, quick to call for drastic action such as a multi-billion pound programme to replace all level crossings.

Perhaps the television executives' response reflected the sort of over-reaction to the event they were anticipating nationwide. But, more worryingly, were they tapping into our increasing tendency to make a big, over-sentimental show of wallowing in grief at every public tragedy?

The shallow gesture of refusing to watch Jenny Agutter in The Railway Children won't make a blind bit of difference to the families of those killed in the Berkshire disaster and only trivialises the true depth of their sorrow. They will still be grieving when the film is rescheduled in a few weeks' time. Sadly, by then, we will probably have moved on to the next tragedy.

COMING from Northern Ireland, where we do not have the same emphasis on Guy Fawkes on Bonfire Night, I was fascinated by Ripon's November 5 celebrations.

The story behind the Gunpowder Plot was entertainingly recounted to the crowds before huge models of the main protagonists were set ablaze. As we cheered heartily, I couldn't help but be impressed that, nearly 400 years after the event, so many loyal subjects still feel so strongly about this act of treachery against their monarchy and Parliament.

But then, at the end, when the announcer mentioned light-heartedly that, next year, organisers were hoping to raise enough money to burn the real Houses of Parliament, there were even bigger cheers. Which sort of defeated the object. Perhaps everyone was just there for the fireworks...

THE five students from Newcastle University's Mountaineering Club stranded in the dark on a sheer rock face 800ft up Snowdon admitted they started climbing at the ridiculously late time of 4.30pm. "But it quickly got dark and we couldn't see what we were doing," said PhD Chris Meikle, clearly taken completely by surprise. Just as well common sense isn't a requirement for university entry.

A MOTORING journalist wrote off a £56,000 car when he spun it while accelerating on a wet road during a test drive. "The car is frightening," he wrote afterwards. Maybe, but it's not half as terrifying as the driver.