Another deadline has come and gone in the increasingly bizarre wrangle over London's Tube network.

The Wednesday morning deadline set by London mayor Ken Livingstone for London Underground to hand over details on the PPP Tube deals came and went - and was then extended.

The deadlines are becoming like the trains themselves - if you missed the first one another came along shortly.

Livingstone and his transport commissioner Bob Kiley have now given London Underground until 9.30am today to hand over vital documents or face High Court action.

Their decision came after the mayor's lawyers received a 34-page fax from LU which the legal team concluded after several hours of analysis was still not enough.

Livingstone again called for further documents to be handed over to enable his team to assess fully the government's £16 billion public private partnership plan to modernise the Tube.

His first deadline had been set for Friday which was extended at London Underground's request - on the grounds that they could not meet it until Monday. This was further extended to 10 am on Wednesday but this has been pushed forward again.

It was revealed that during that time transport secretary Stephen Byers has written to the mayor urging him not to begin the threatened judicial review arguing it would only further delay much-need modernisation work.