Tory MPs call on Chris Grayling to freeze rail fare hikes until services improve
Transport secretary Chris Grayling is facing calls from his own MPs to freeze rail fares for three months until services improve.
A handful of Tory MPs have demanded that the annual 3.2 per cent fare increase, to be introduced from January, should not come into force until passengers using Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR) and Great Northern experience three months of "reliable, sustained" services that were supposed to be brought in by a revamped timetable in May.
GTR runs the Thameslink, Great Northern and Southern services and was the worst hit by the botched May timetable.
Network Rail engineering delays meant the timetable was rushed through just a few weeks in advance instead of the usual 12, meaning there was a shortage of time for drivers to learn the new routes. The mishap has meant commuters have endured months of cancellations, delays and overcrowding.
In an email to Grayling, Tory MPs Bim Afolami, Heidi Allen, Stephen McPartland and Jonathan Djanogly said they regarded GTR's recent announcement that it would extend compensation to non-season ticket holders as a "bare minimum".
"Given that services are still not what they should be, we ask that you also give urgent consideration to a 'fare freeze' for the long-suffering passengers of the Great Northern franchise who have endured a dreadful summer of delays, cancellations and overcrowded services," they said.
"Passengers should not be expected to routinely pay more for less."
The letter noted that GTR accounts for 35 per cent of delays and cancellations against a national average of 35 per cent, but that Network Rail accounts for 61 per cent of all GTR's cancellations.
"The concentrated human cost of these percentages is played out in the massive impact these delays and cancellations have had on our constituents; missed business opportunities; lost work time; resignations; missed children's bedtimes; stress-related illness; additional expense incurred through added travel arrangements. The toll has been huge.
"We cannot ask hard-pressed commuters to fund a fare increase on the back of this performance.
"A fare freeze, held in place until benchmarked improvements of three months is sustained is a proportionate and reasonable way to acknowledge the suffering endured by these passengers."
Network Rail's regulator, the Office of Road and Rail, is currently conducting an enquiry into the fiasco and will report of its findings later in the autumn.
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