A RAILWAY chief from Tadley has found himself at the centre of a media storm after commuters endured massive rail disruption over Christmas.

Mark Carne, the chief executive of Network Rail, vowed he will not take his expected £34,000 bonus this year after criticism following overrunning engineering works.

Thousands of passengers were left stranded when London King’s Cross station closed last Saturday and London Paddington was also temporarily shut when the work did not finish on time. By Monday, normal service had resumed.

Mr Carne, who lives in a detached country home in Tadley, said the maximum bonus he was likely to receive would be five per cent of his £675,000 annual salary.

On Monday, he refused to say whether he would accept that bonus.

But a day later on Tuesday, Mr Carne said he would not take his bonus from the taxpayer-owned infrastructure company.

He said: “We have disappointed too many passengers particularly at King’s Cross and Paddington in the aftermath of Christmas and for that I am sincerely sorry.

“Ultimately I am accountable for the performance of the railway, and bonuses are performance related, and I think at the moment our performance is not good enough.”

If Network Rail had reported a good performance, Mr Carne would have been entitled to a maximum bonus of 20 per cent of his annual salary - £135,000.

Mr Carne added: “I took this job 10 months ago knowing that improving the performance of the railway was going to be a huge challenge, but it’s one that I relish, one that I am really up for and I think we’ve got a good plan now for how we’re going to tackle it.”

He also said that he was determined to carry on and lead some “huge projects” to success.

One of those projects is the building of a £10million regional control and training centre on the Gresley Road site in Basingstoke.

Work started on the Basingstoke Campus in September 2013 and is expected to be completed in early 2015.