Transport Secretary ‘has not made decision about train fares for next year’

Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander said she has not made a decision about train fares for next year, ahead of the nationalisation of a third rail company by the Labour Government.

Greater Anglia, which is operated by the Transport UK Group and runs trains in Norfolk, Suffolk, Essex, Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire, is to be taken into public ownership on Sunday.

It is the seventh of 14 train operating companies that will form passenger services under Great British Railways – an upcoming public sector body that will oversee Britain’s rail infrastructure and train operation.

Ms Alexander visited Norwich train station on Thursday, where she viewed a train with a ‘Great British Railways – coming soon’ sticker on it.

Asked if fares would go up, she said: “I haven’t made a decision about fares for next year.

“I am very conscious that the travelling public want an affordable railway and an affordable public transport system more generally.

“At the moment we spend over £10 billion per year of taxpayers’ money on investing and maintaining the infrastructure, the tracks, the signalling on the railways.

“There’s a gap of about £2 billion as well each year between the money that comes in through fare revenue and the day to day running costs of the trains.

“I need to get the balance right between the contribution that farepayers are making and what (contribution) the taxpayer is making.

“So I can’t promise that fares are going to come down but I’m acutely aware that people want to get value for money.”

The overall passenger satisfaction rating for Greater Anglia was 89% in the most recent research by watchdog Transport Focus.

This was the joint sixth best performance out of 22 operators.

Ms Alexander described Greater Anglia as “one of the best-performing train operating companies in the country”.

She said “what we really want to do is learn from what Greater Anglia are doing and make sure that’s replicated across the rest of the country”.

She said that she was “absolutely determined that when we bring the train operating companies into public ownership that the first thing we’ve got to do is make sure we’ve got more reliability on the railways”.

Martin Beable, managing director of Greater Anglia said: “By working more closely with the wider family of publicly owned operators, we can share expertise, drive innovation, and deliver even better journeys for our passengers across the Anglia region.”

South Western Railway became the first operator brought into public ownership by the Labour Government in May.

This was followed by c2c, which runs services between London Fenchurch Street and south Essex, in July.

They joined Northern, TransPennine Express, Southeastern and LNER, which were nationalised under the Conservative government because of performance failings by the former owners of those franchises.

West Midlands Trains services will be the next to be nationalised on February 1 2026.

Govia Thameslink Railway’s (GTR) services will follow on May 31 2026, with Chiltern Railways and Great Western Railways services expected to follow later, with final decisions yet to be made on dates.