Huge fare hike for commuters

The cost of travelling between Ashford and London, the route used by Rye passengers, is set to soar by 12 percent. The move has been slammed by Rye MP Amber Rudd who has started a petition against what she has called “excessive” train fares. She said: “This government has taken a view that it has to cut certain expenditure and unfortunately transport has come into that. “I think that Southeastern should take its share and try to improve the service if it’s going to put up prices by this amount.” A season ticket from Ashford International to London on Southeastern will rise by 12.7% to £4,328. Transport union TSSA has said the increases are “simply outrageous”, and the RMT union has said passengers will be paying “inflation-busting increases to travel on overcrowded services”. The Association of Train Operating Companies attempted to put a gloss on the figures by confining itself to admitting that average fares would rise 6.2 per cent. The increase has come about after The Coalition this week announced it was relaxing restrictions on train companies’ prices for next year. Instead of insisting on uniform price rises across all the different types of ticket on sale, ministers will allow companies to apply different rises. Under the new fare rules, companies can increase ticket prices by as much as five percent above the standard inflationary rise, which will next year be 5.8 per cent. Anthony Smith of Passenger Focus said: “In the past, train companies have used the fares basket flexibility to impose increases of more than 10 per cent on some routes. “Passengers will wait anxiously to see if this freedom is used by operators just to get rid of ‘anomalies’ or whether some will face rises of more than double the rate of inflation.” Although trains are operated by private companies, the industry receives more than £5 billion a year in subsidies from taxpayers. Ministers are cutting that funding as part of the wider cuts in public spending. Sarah Boundy, a spokeswoman for Southeastern which runs trains from Kent and East Sussex into London, said: “Nobody wants to hear that prices will increase. “But this is part of government policy to move more of the cost of rail travel towards passengers and away from tax-payers.”