FREIGHT trains are already running from Ebbw Vale to Newport on a regular basis.

Now we learn that the drivers training on the new Ebbw Vale rail link are operating the trains in and out of Newport, through the Gaer junction.

This is despite the constant message from all those involved in this project that the signalling at the Gaer junction is not good enough to allow a passenger service to operate between the valleys line and Newport.

We fail to understand how the signalling can be good enough for freight trains and for training drivers on the passenger service but not good enough for the passenger trains themselves.

Surely an accident involving a freight train would be just as serious as one involving a passenger train.

Further, the cost of upgrading the signalling cannot be so prohibitive that the work cannot be done now.

If the cost is small in relative terms then this should be being pushed by everybody from Newport city council to Blaenau Gwent borough council to the Assembly and other organisations with a vested interest, such as Newport Unlimited.

We have said time and time again that the valleys are an important economic factor both ways for Newport.

The jobs, shops, educational and other facilities being created in Newport should be readily available to people living in Ebbw Vale.

The redevelopment of the city could and should be, the engine for regeneration of the valley communities.

Traditionally they have had much more linkage with Newport than with Cardiff and we still cannot see the logic in opening the service to Cardiff without linking to Newport.