Train passengers 'punished' as fares rise by almost 5 per cent

Train fares are going up by nearly 5 per cent from today (Sunday 3 March) even though cancellations are at among the highest levels for 10 years.

Public transport campaigners said that passengers were being “punished” and would be angry about the price increases.

The equivalent of 3.9 per cent of services in England and Wales were cancelled in the year to Saturday 3 February, according to an analysis of Office of Rail and Road (ORR) figures by the PA news agency.

That is narrowly below the worst performance of 4.1 per cent in records dating back to 2014.

Reliability has been affected by several factors in recent months, including strikes, infrastructure faults and severe weather.

But despite this, an annual season ticket from Brighton to London is going up by £275 from £5,616 to £5,891.

Chris Page, who chairs the pressure group Railfuture, said: “Why are rail passengers being punished year after year with inflation-busting fare rises?

“No matter that there’s a ‘cost of living crisis’, no matter that we’re facing a climate emergency, the government seems more determined than ever to price us off the railway and on to the roads.”

Labour’s Shadow Transport Secretary Louise Haigh said: “This fare rise will be tough for passengers to stomach given the shocking state of rail services up and down the country.

“Since coming to power in 2010 the Tories have hiked fares by almost twice as much as wages and now passengers are being asked to pay more for less.”

Campaign for Better Transport campaigns manager Michael Solomon Williams said: “At a time when we urgently need to encourage people to take the train, the public will rightly be angry to discover that it has just become even more expensive to do so.

“We know that people will decide to drive or fly if the train is too expensive so this is bad news for our personal finances, the wider economy and the environment.”

Rail Minister Huw Merriman said last month that the government had tried to “split the balance between the UK taxpayer and the fare payer” in relation to fare rises which he described as being “well below inflation”.

ORR figures show that the Westminster administration provided £4.4 billion of funding to train operators in Britain in the year to the end of March 2023.

The Retail Prices Index measure of inflation, which is traditionally used to determine annual fare rises, was 9 per cent last July.

The Consumer Prices Index, which is a more commonly used inflation figure, was 6.8 per cent in July 2023 but fell to 4 per cent in January.

The UK and Welsh governments set the cap for rises in regulated fares at 4.9 per cent.

These include season tickets on most commuter journeys, some off-peak return tickets on long-distance routes and flexible tickets for travel around major cities.

Train operators set unregulated fares such as advance singles although their decisions are heavily influenced by the government because of contracts introduced because of the coronavirus pandemic.

Rises in these fares are expected to be similar to those for regulated fares.