TRAIN USERS are set for Christmas misery for the second year in succession, according to a rail chief.

Work on the West Coast main line, which runs from Glasgow to London and includes Manchester, was supposed to be completed next month.

But Tony Collins, chief executive of Virgin Trains, has said that it may not be finished until June.

He fears a repeat of last year's New Year travel chaos when planned work overran for four days.

The Manchester to London line will be closed for two extra days over Christmas as a result of the latest setback.

Traditionally there no services on 25 and 26 December. But this year, thanks to signalling work at Milton Keynes, there will be no direct Manchester to London service on the 27 and 28.

Mr Collins added that sections of the line will be shut every weekend until June so engineers can complete the additional work.

Trains will be diverted and bus replacement services will be introduced - which could cause disruption to thousands of passengers.

Virgin Trains is expected to sue Network Rail, the government-backed body responsible for the £8bn work, for millions if the expected disruptions materialise.

A Virgin spokesman said that passengers travelling north from Manchester towards Scotland would be worst affected.

He explained: "Most of the work we are talking about is between Preston and Glasgow. We're not expecting it to have a massive impact on Manchester unless you are travelling north."

New high speed services will begin on 14 December as planned bringing journey times of just over two hours from Piccadilly to London Euston.

Network Rail have insisted the major work will be completed by the 14 December deadline.

But Mr Collins added that a publicity blitz by Virgin, planned for December, has been delayed.

He said: "We wanted to go out there with lots of publicity, saying `It's here, it works, it's reliable'. But we are holding that back until we have the confidence that it works."

Mr Collins also believes there may be teething problems after the work has been finished.

He said: "We are still nervous about how it's going to work. There is a question mark over the reliability of the infrastructure - if there is a problem, the impact on the network will be great."

Some 1,500 trains operate on the line each day and 1,695 miles of track is being replaced.

The upgrade has been dogged by controversy with Railtrack, Network Rail's predecessor, originally believing it would be completed by 2005.