LONDON (Reuters) - Network Rail and maintenance company Jarvis Rail are to be prosecuted over the 2002 Potters Bar rail crash that killed seven people.

Members of the emergency services remove a body from the scene of the fatal Potters Bar rail crash, May 10, 2002. REUTERS/Files

The Office of Rail Regulation (ORR) said it had begun criminal proceedings against the two companies for “breaches of health and safety law, which caused the Potters Bar derailment.”

In May 2002, a high-speed train on its way to King’s Lynn, Norfolk from King’s Cross in London came off the tracks and a carriage ploughed into Potters Bar station in Hertfordshire resulting in seven deaths and numerous injuries.

Network Rail and Jarvis are both being charged for failing to provide and implement suitable and sufficient training, standards, procedures and guidance for the installation, maintenance and inspection of adjustable stretcher bars on the rail line.

Stretcher bars keep moveable section of track at the right width for the train’s wheels. A Health and Safety Executive report released in May 2003 found that several nuts that held the stretcher bars were missing and components were in poor condition.

The companies could face unlimited fines if found guilty.

“I have decided there is enough evidence, and it is in the public interest, to prosecute Network Rail and Jarvis Rail for serious health and safety breaches,” said Ian Prosser, director of rail safety at the regulator,

At the time of the accident, the infrastructure controller for the national rail network was Railtrack Plc, which was taken over Network Rail in October 2002.

Jarvis, which was the maintenance contractor for the Potters Bar area of the national network in 2002, went into administration in March.

Transport Secretary Philip Hammond told BBC that if the regulator had found prima facie evidence of wrongdoing, it was right that they launch a prosecution.

The prosecution follows the conclusion of an inquest earlier this year, in which a jury returned verdicts of accidental death for all the fatalities.

Network Rail said in response to the charges the railway had changed since the Potters Bar accident and private contractors no longer controlled day-to-day maintenance of the network. It also said all of the recommendations made by the industry’s formal inquiry and the Health and Safety investigation had been implemented.

The first court date is January 7 next year at Watford Magistrates’ Court.