Newcastle politicians condemn ‘catastrophic’ plan to axe rail ticket …
Newcastle councillors have condemned “catastrophic” plans that would leave the city’s railway station as the only mainline stop in the North East with a ticket office.
Proposals for a mass closure of ticket offices across England were unveiled last week and have sparked a wave of anger. In the North East, all LNER ticket offices on the East Coast Main Line would shut other than the one at Newcastle Central – while Northern plans to shut all theirs in the region apart from Hartlepool.
Newcastle City Council[1] leader Nick Kemp told colleagues on Wednesday night that the proposals, announced by industry body the Rail Delivery Group (RDG), were “led by greed”. As city politicians unanimously passed a motion condemning the closures, Coun Kemp added: “Fundamentally this is an action taken by greed and has a disinterest in the customer, service user, and is in my mind discriminatory. It ignores so many citizens by exclusion and unfairness.”
Labour[3] councillor Charlie Gray branded the scheme the latest effort to “dehumanise” the railways and warned it would have a disproportionate impact on disabled people, the elderly, and those without access to the internet. Coun Kemp told the council chamber that only three per cent of people with sight loss said they could use a ticket machine without problems and that 23% of disabled adults have no access to the internet, compared to six per cent of non-disabled adults.
Transport union the RMT has warned that the move will remove regulations on staffing and give operators the ability to “de-staff any station to whatever level they choose”, while the RDG has argued that it is needed to modernise services. George Pattison, a Labour councillor in the Kingston Park South and Newbiggin Hall ward, said he had worked on the railways for 40 years and witnessed serious incidents including sexual assault and violence, problems which he feared could become worse if stations are left unstaffed by these “catastrophic” proposals.
Lib Dem transport spokesman Thom Campion added that the closures would create a “two-tier” system between those who are able to navigate the UK’s “complex” rail system and those who will be left behind. RDG chief executive Jacqueline Starr said last week that the ways passengers buy their tickets has changed and “it’s time for the railway to change with them”.
She added: “With just 12% of tickets being sold from ticket offices last year, and 99% of those transactions being available on TVMs (ticket vending machines) or online, our proposals would mean more staff on hand to give face-to-face help with a much wider range of support, from journey planning, to finding the right ticket and helping those with accessibility needs.”
The Department for Transport has insisted that the closures are “not about cutting jobs” and that no station that is currently staffed would become unstaffed as a result.
References
- ^ Newcastle City Council (www.chroniclelive.co.uk)
- ^ RMT boss Mick Lynch set to attend rally in Berwick protesting ticket office closures (www.chroniclelive.co.uk)
- ^ Labour (www.chroniclelive.co.uk)