RACHAEL MASKELL is right to highlight the problems faced by York employers and employees (and the country generally) caused by ever-increasing rail fare rises and states that Labour is looking at reforming the entire rail fare structure (Rail users face fare hike gloom, The Press, January 2).
She should be aware that since the Beeching cuts of the 1960s, proposed by the Conservative Government of Harold Macmillan but implemented by the Labour Government of Harold Wilson, the main source of income from the railway system has been passenger fares.
Freight income has steadily declined with the reduction in coal and steel production, to the point where it now forms only five per cent of total income with income from passenger services totalling 55 per cent, while Government subsidy totals 36 per cent (2016).
At the last Labour conference, Jeremy Corbyn announced that Labour will commit to a clear plan for a fully integrated railway in public ownership (renationalisation) as the present franchises run out.
Supporters of renationalisation point out that the cost of taking all routes into public ownership immediately would be billions of pounds, but supporters of partrenationalisation, where routes are brought into state control when franchises expire, claim there would be minimal cost to the taxpayer because the operator would make money from fares.
Perhaps Rachael can tell us how she intends to reduce fares when her supporters depend upon income from fares to fund the system?
R Suttill, Holgate, York
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