BEMUSED travellers on the Caledonian Sleeper trains were able to knock back wine - but not buy any food.

The fancy train, where a cabin can cost as much as £355, is subsidised by the taxpayer.

But staff shortages provoked outrage from hungry passengers who found themselves unable to buy anything to eat.

Fergus McCallum, who uses the Sleeper weekly, said he had been dumbfounded at being unable to get food on the southbound Sleeper from Edinburgh on Sunday night.

Mr McCallum said: "Staff announcing they are overworked won't sell any food between Edinburgh and London but are still selling booze.

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“They have absolutely lost the plot from a customer focus point of view.

"The train has families and kids, so they will deal with short staffing by dropping food on an eight-hour journey but continue selling alcohol.

"It's subsidised by the Scottish taxpayer, but let's not feed the kids of visitors and Scottish families food but keep flogging wine.

“The management are incompetent.

“They do not appear to have applied any common sense.

"The new trains are a massive step forward, but managers should have made sure food was available, and if necessary shut the bar instead."

And on the 12-hour Inverness-London Sleeper, passenger Gillon Johnstone said people weren't told until the train had set off that last-minute staff sickness meant no food could be served.

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Mr Johnstone said: "There was no apology and a lot of unhappy people of all ages on that train."

Ryan Flaherty, Serco's managing director for Caledonian Sleeper, said: "Due to some short-notice staff absences, we were unfortunately not able to provide our usual evening food and drink options in the club car on some recent services.

"Where possible, we contacted guests in advance to notify them of this and we apologise to anyone who was inconvenienced."

Operator Serco revealed last week the service made a £3 million loss in the year to March despite £23m of Scottish Government funding.

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Members of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union (RMT) voted by 89-7 to strike over "intolerable" working pressure on the new fleet, which was introduced on the routes between Edinburgh, Glasgow and London in April.

RMT Scotland organiser Gordon Martin said a "productive" meeting had since been held with Serco and there were no plans to order action at this stage.

The Scottish Government's Transport Scotland agency said the catering problem was an "operational matter" that was for Serco to comment on.