Railway jobs fair in Wolsingham (From The Northern Echo)

Railway jobs fair in Wolsingham

6:03pm Monday 15th March 2010 in

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A TRAINEE engine driver is one of 16 people being recruited by a North-East tourist railway at a job’s fair on Wednesday.

The Weardale Railway, in County Durham, has won cash from the government’s Future Jobs Fund to take on the workers at Stanhope Station and its Wolsingham depot.

More than 100 people have already expressed an interest in the jobs, which will start by March 29 and will include at least five apprenticeships as well as a driver and café staff.

The Railway is expanding into freight after operating as a heritage line under American owners British American Railway Services Ltd.

Its plans to build a coal loading depot at Wolsingham have been met with fierce opposition from residents, although they are welcomed in neighbouring communities Toft Hill and Fir Tree who do not want coal lorries passing homes on the A68.

Arthur Temple, from the Weardale Railway Trust, said: "The jobs are a tremendous opportunity and we hope they will go to local people.

"If we can get people into work that otherwise wouldn’t have jobs it will be a real achievement.

"There is a lot happening. We have had two charter trains to Stanhope and another four are coming. It puts a lot of work on the volunteers to cope with.

"The jobs are for six months so they will take us over the summer but we hope they will continue.

"They will get people into the way of working, which is a good thing."

Advisers from Job Centre Plus, Groundwork North-East, the Weardale Railway and other groups will be at the jobs fair in Wolsingham Town Hall between 9am and 4pm.