A section of the Manx Electric Railway, which welders were brought from the UK to work on, still requires completing.

Five welders were jailed for a Covid-19 breach when they went to Tesco to buy beer, despite being told not to by their supervisor.

One of the five later tested positive for Covid-19, which led to a lockdown at the prison. At the time, it was said the workers had been brought to the island as the work needs to be completed and the skills don’t exist in the island.

In the first Keys sitting since the summer recess, Infrastructure Minister Tim Baker said the work had not yet been carried out but admitted ’those individuals are probably not going to be particularly keen to come back to the Isle of Man’.

Mr Baker, in response to a supplementary question from Claire Barber (Douglas East), added that despite this issue ’clearly the island does have a need to have properly welded railways, so there is going to be a need to do ongoing maintenance work on our railway infrastructure’.

Mr Baker told the Keys that the expertise for the welding, which includes an ’exothermic process’ is not available on the island.

He said: ’A mould is installed around the ends of two adjacent rails, the ends of which are preheated and a carefully measured amount of thermite powder poured in. The thermite is then ignited with the ensuing reaction to allow molten steel to flow into the mould and fuse the rails.’

However he did say he would instruct DoI officers to explore whether the work could be brought in house.

It has never been confirmed what stretch of tracks the welders were brought here to work on.