Staff are due new uniforms this month as replacements for their GNER uniforms which the staff are still wearing 17 months after National Express took over the East Coast line. But ladies will be allowed to wear their old shirts as the new ones are too... thought provoking. In other words, anyone queuing for a sandwich from the buffet car could get an eyeful of cleavage and whatever else the good women of National Express keep down their fronts.
When concerns about the modesty of the ladies was raised by the Transport Salaried Staff Association, National Express didn't take it very seriously - no doubt because of the misconception that nobody, least of all the women themselves, should mind a bit of extra breast with your cup of coffee. When it was pointed out that the uniform for men did not involve sheer materials, and that the bosses of National Express themselves (or their wives) may not enjoy striding up and down jiggling, wobbling trains all day in see-through shirts, the shirts were withdrawn and permission to continue with the old ones was granted.
If you're leaving London for Edinburgh and are on a National Express train to the north any time soon, relax: you're not going to see anything the ladies don't want you to see.
