The council meetings, unlike in most other authorities, are held in early afternoon and the Mayor, Dorothy Layton, conducts the business so briskly with lots of references to the red book - not Mao but the standing orders - that meetings rarely take more than an hour.Yesterday, Ron Gillies, the long-standing chairman of the Racecourse Committee, said he had drawn "the short straw" because most of the leading councillors were away in London for the shortlisting, leaving him to face the music over "Donnygate".Mr Gillies outlined the new controls on foreign trips. He was quick to say that the District Auditor was not against the "principle of foreign trips," but he was worried about the way they had been sanctioned. While many are beneficial in attracting help from Europe and inward investment, Mr Gillies said all trips would be submitted to a council committee for approval in future.The Tory councillors' attempts to make a few political points were rather ruined when their leader, John Dainty, admitted he had gone on a council trip to Wilmington, Delaware, to look at social services, and hastily added: "But we travelled economy class.". Steve Bennett, an amateur rocket builder, was yesterday searching for his latest missile after it roared into the clouds and vanished. A signal from the 10-foot Lexx rocket abruptly stopped and there was no sign of it floating back to earth on its built-in parachute over the Cheviot Hills in Northumberland. On top of that, Mr Bennett's hope of breaking the sound barrier appeared to have been dashed as he listened in vain for a tell-tale sonic boom. But Mr Bennett, 33, was not disappointed. "I am remaining optimistic," he said as he stood in rain driven by a fierce wind over 1,000 feet up on the Otterburn Army Ranges."The conditions were really poor with all this rain and wind and there was a point when I was afraid it might not leave the ground today, so it was a big relief when it did go."As far as I am concerned it has at least been a 50 per cent successful exercise."If we get the rest of the rocket back it will have been 100 per cent successful.

As for whether we reached the height and speed hoped for, we won't know until we get the vehicle back and analyse the data from it."Problems including short circuits meant the countdown was repeated five times before the rocket hurtled into the cloud base and out of sight.Until Mr Bennett and his six-year-old son Max can find it and check the data from its instruments its performance will remain a mystery.He was not too surprised that observers had not seen the rocket parachuting back down to the ground, "as in this wind it would have drifted, so it could be coming down four miles to the north-west".The flight was a test of the top stage of a planned 22-foot rocket - his biggest yet - which he hopes to launch in about six weeks. "It will be full steam ahead with the three-stage vehicle, which we are going to send up three miles, hopefully before the end of March."Mr Bennett expects it eventually to reach altitudes of 15 miles The world record for an amateur launch is 10 miles. "We're still on target for April; there was nothing wrong with the motor. This is the run-up to our getting a satellite into space by the new millennium."Mr Bennett is sponsored by Lexx, a science-fiction television series due for release this year.He is also working with the University of Salford, testing engine power, computer software and parachute mechanisms. He has spent 20 years building some of the world's largest amateur rockets.. Thousands of commuters face delays and train cancellations after a privatised rail company's decision to cut 71 drivers amid the introduction of new working practices. Thirty-nine trains have been wiped off the South West Trains daily timetable as the company struggles to instruct new drivers.

The move came after a fortnight of misery for travellers in southern England where an average of 17 services a day were scrapped. One cancellation left 800 passengers stranded in the rush hour. More than 200 train services throughout London, Surrey and Hampshire will be cancelled this week. Stagecoach, the bus and rail company which took over the company last year, admitted the curtailed services could take six weeks to sort out.John Watts, the transport minister, described South West Trains' actions as "somewhat inept" and warned that the company faced large fines for failing to meet its obligations.The Labour Party seized on the cancellations as proof that privatisation was not working. "South West Trains have broken their privatisation pledges, leaving passengers cheated out of the rail services they were promised a year ago," said Andrew Smith, Labour's spokesman on transport.A spokeswoman for SWT said: "This is the last thing we wanted to do but we felt it was the best way to minimise inconvenience to passengers."Of the 39 daily services affected, 33 were short-distance shuttle services, and many were on routes also served by other operators, she said. However, some mainline services between Portsmouth and Waterloo were also affected.The company offered drivers voluntary severance as part of a major restructuring programme to bring in new pay and working conditions.The deal - meant to introduce greater flexibility - replaces a wage package worth up to pounds 23,000 with a flat rate worth between pounds 25,000-pounds 26,000. The new system meant that some of the company's 650 drivers transferred to other depots and needed to be retrained to drive different routes, she added.Drivers have to be trained so they know the position of signals, track and stations along the route.

Learner drivers have to be supervised by more experienced hands and this has contributed to the shortage of services on South West's routes.A spokesman for the Office of Passenger Rail Franchising (Opraf), which let the train company last year to Stagecoach, said that SWT was facing "substantial" fines - set to run into tens of thousands of pounds - if the crisis was prolonged."This event should not have happened," said a spokesman for Opraf. "We are monitoring the company's progress and would like to see a swift return to the agreed timetable."The fine is unlikely to dent the company's balance sheet unless it continued for months. Under South West Trains' contract with the Government it is paid more than pounds 5m a month to run the service. Any penalty would be taken out of this monthly subsidy.Jonathan Bray, the co-ordinator of railway campaigners Save Our Railways, said: "It's certainly astonishing incompetence by management We're not aware of anything like it happening before.". Underground passengers were led to safety yesterday after the derailment of a tube train at King's Cross/Euston.