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Archive
2014-05-05 RDG-001
Rail Delivery Group
“Renationalisation would be bad for passengers, taxpayers and the country as a whole.”
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Press release
Rail Delivery Group
“Renationalisation would be bad for passengers, taxpayers and the country as a whole.”
Responding to a letter from 30 Labour prospective parliamentary candidates, claiming rail renationalisation would cut commuter fares, Martin Griffiths, chairman of the Rail Delivery Group, which speaks on behalf of Britain's railway, said:
"It is wrong to blame private train companies for above inflation increases in the average cost of commuter fares. The annual increase has nothing to do with who operates services and everything to do with government policy.
"Successive governments instructed operators to increase the average price of commuter fares in real terms every year from 2004 to last year. This has meant passengers, rather than taxpayers, have been paying a greater share of the cost of running the railway.
"Commuter fares were held down in line with inflation by the government this year. Train companies supported that decision and government, whatever party is in power, is free to decide what happens in future years.
"Holding up publicly-run East Coast as a model of how to run a better railway is a myth that is equally wrong. Over the last twenty years, Britain's railway has been transformed into the preeminent network in Europe.
"Renationalisation would be bad for passengers, taxpayers and the country as a whole."
ENDS
Railnews Archive ::: 2014-05-05 RDG-001
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