THE leader of Oxfordshire County Council has demanded the “harshest punishment” possible for vandals who stole copper cabling from a train signal box.

Hundreds of commuters were left stranded at Oxford station on Friday after the theft caused the cancellation of every First Great Western fast service to London Paddington until 3pm.

Last night county council leader Keith Mitchell branded those responsible as “morons” and said they deserved to be put in stocks and have rotten fruit thrown at them.

Mr Mitchell, Conservative councillor for Bloxham, said: “Assuming that vandals are indeed the root of the problem here, the blame lies with the morons in question.

“I use the word morons in substitute for a number of less polite words that I might feel inclined to deploy in describing these people.

He added: “If the police catch up with them I hope that the legal system will give them the harshest punishment available.

“I would imagine many travellers will be sorry that certain punishments will not available to magistrates or crown courts to hand down.

“One that springs to mind is putting these vandals in stocks and allowing commuters affected by their actions to throw rotten fruit at them.”

Writing on his online blog, Mr Mitchell urged frustrated passengers not to vent their anger at the train operators.

He said: “The Rail industry is often pilloried, frequently with good reason, when services run late.

“On these occasions, blame most certainly cannot be laid at the door of train operators or Network Rail.”

Thieves took more than 40 metres of copper cable from a signal box from Tilehurst station, near Reading, shortly before 1am.

Passengers faced delays of up to 90-minutes on some First Great Western services.

Insp Will Jordan, of British Transport Police, said: “Cable theft is an extremely dangerous activity and causes huge disruption to the railway network.

“Those who steal cable are not just risking a prison sentence, they are also risking serious injury.