John Leech
Main Page: John Leech (Liberal Democrat - Manchester, Withington)Department Debates - View all John Leech's debates with the Department for Transport
(12 years, 4 months ago)
Commons ChamberRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
Mrs Villiers
The hon. Gentleman is completely naive in his approach to Ken Livingstone’s proposals on fares. Livingstone’s numbers simply do not add up, and his track record shows that he promises fare reductions and ends up delivering fare hikes.
Mr John Leech (Manchester, Withington) (LD)
Does the Minister agree that no station operator should be allowed to close ticket offices where there are any real concerns about security and safety as a result of creating an unmanned station?
Mrs Villiers
Certainly, if we were to change the way ticket offices operate, we would need to look carefully at all safety and security consequences, as well as taking into account the concerns of the disabled community and pensioners. However, we do need to look at ticket offices as part of the process of reducing costs on the railways, in order to deliver the better value for money that passengers want. We need to do that because the way passengers are buying tickets is changing. Oyster in London demonstrates that there are some high-quality alternatives to the ticket queue. If we can roll those out more widely, which we plan to do with ITSO smart ticketing, that will make a difference to our approach to future decisions on ticket offices.