IRECENTLY made a complaint to South Eastern Trains (SET) about the appaling level of multi-coloured tagging graffiti that is to be found plastered along every railway wall, signal box and adjacent property for a continuous 30 mile stretch from Gravesend to Charing Cross.

This represents massive illegal trespass and criminal damage on a truly epic scale, which indicates not only has law and order broken down but proves a vicious level of hooliganism and nihilism exists which would disgrace a Third World country.

Nothing is apparently done to stop it by the police or authorities so the graffiti gets worse year on year.

It was when I heard through the grapevine vandals had entered the Slade Green maintenance depot and adjacent sidings at the dead of night to spray paint on the trains themselves, I realised this could represent a serious terrorism threat.

There are also hints that signal box wires have been tampered with.

When I contacted SET, Marion McGill of customer services, simply treated it as a little local irritation, and passed the buck onto the British Transport Police.

They, in turn, suggested they didn't have the staff to either use the available technology to remove it or to police the railway tracks at night to prevent vandals from doing it.

Ms McGill said the process involved "painstaking gathering of evidence and handwriting analysis".

This laid-back attitude is totally unacceptable and itself is criminally irresponsible.

The British Transport Police should appeal directly to the Home Office for millions of pounds of extra funding to pay for security guards without delay.

They could force the government's hand by saying it could become a national security issue or health issue.

Failing this the solution would be to treat spray paint cans as a serious anti-social and criminal weapon on a par with firearms and simply ban the retail sale of such items to members of the public of any age and make them available only to business concerns.

TONY MILNE Abbey Wood