'Why more time MUST be taken to to rethink ticket office shutdown plans'

25 July 2023 , 22:08

977     0

Ticket offices face mass closure (Image: Maureen McLean/REX/Shutterstock)

Under pressure to extend consultations on shutting all train station ticket offices, rail companies and their Fat Controllers in No10 should listen to passengers.

Axing even popular, busy ones will ­intensify the backlash and strengthen the legal case of Labour mayors preparing a court challenge to decisions that appear to have been taken before anybody was asked what they thought.

The TUC’s High Court win against the Tories’ strike-breaking agency worker regulations, proving they were unlawful, should be a warning to any bosses hell-bent on a rail crash.

Ticket offices are valued by those who use them, particularly the elderly and vulnerable, and those of us who are bamboozled by often confusing platform machines.

More time to rethink the shutdown plans could result in a better railway.

Teachers, civil servants and train drivers walk out in biggest strike in decade

Homes crisis

When the number of families in ­temporary homes soars to the worst level since figures first started 25 years ago, the housing crisis isn’t only about house buyers unable to afford rising mortgages.

That 104,510 households, including 64,940 with children, have no permanent place in England alone is an indictment to Tory failure.

The financial cost of B&Bs, hotels, hostels and other temporary rooms is huge for taxpayers but it is the human toll that really shames the Tories who let this happen.

Housing is bust for millions so we ­desperately need a fresh start with a new, energetic and caring government that solves problems instead of creating more.

Blaze heroes

Two Greek firefighters dying is a grim reminder that when most flee infernos there are others who rush towards danger to save lives, property and land.

And as climate change smashes historic records by creating hotter, drier and longer periods across Britain, Europe and the world, we either stop heating up our planet or there’ll be more blazes and, inevitably, more deaths.

Voice of the Mirror