Train rip-off...UK rail fares are the costliest in Europe
RAIL passengers who regularly face the misery of late, overcrowded trains are paying far more than their European counterparts.
For a little more than the price of an annual season ticket from Liverpool to Manchester you can buy a ticket that lets you travel across the entire German network for a year.
UK passengers pay on average 50p per mile travelled compared to as little as 21p per mile in Spain and 15p per mile in Italy.
Britons are paying over the odds even when allowing for differences in national salaries, the study by personal finance experts Credit Angel revealed.
The monthly cost of a season ticket as a percentage of average monthly wages ranges from as little as 2.4 per cent for a 68-mile round trip in France to 14 per cent for a 70-mile return journey in England.
Struggling
Despite this, in January UK rail passengers faced an average 3.4 per cent rise in rail fares, the biggest in five years.
Just one in three British commuters thinks their rail service is value for money, a survey by watchdog Transport Focus found.
Demand for cheaper fares was so strong that when a trial of the new railcard for Millennials was launched last month, the website crashed.
Dawn Wood, of Credit Angel, said: “Brits are paying more for inefficiency compared to their European neighbours when it comes to travelling by train.”
RMT general secretary Mick Cash, described the rail industry as a “money-grabbing racket” run by foreign-owned rail firms.
He said: “Not only are British passengers paying the highest fares in Europe but the bulk of the profits raised are being siphoned out of this country to subsidise transport operations across the Continent.”
But Transport Focus director David Sidebottom, said comparing fares across Europe is complicated.
He said: “Our long-distance, ‘walkup’ railway network is expensive compared with other countries but trains do tend to run more frequently in Britain. Travel on long-distance trains can be cheaper in Britain than elsewhere in Europe, but only if you buy the lowest-priced advance ticket on a fixed-time train.”
The Credit Angel study found that an annual season ticket for the 60-mile round trip from Liverpool to Manchester costs about £3,152.
In contrast an annual season ticket for virtually the entire German rail network, a BahnCard 100, costs £3,759.
Similarly the cost of a monthly season ticket as a percentage of average monthly wages works out at 14 per cent for the 70-mile trip from Luton to London and back or 10.6 per cent for the 64-mile return journey from Liverpool to Manchester.
But it equates to 3.9 per cent for the 62-mile round trip from Aranjuez to Madrid in Spain, 3.1 per cent for the 62-mile return journey from Anzio to Rome in Italy and 2.4 per cent for the 68 miles from Mantes-la-Jolie to Paris in France and back.
But the Rail Delivery Group, which represents train firms and Network Rail, said the UK industry gets lower subsidies than most of the rest of Europe and that 97p from every £1 in UK fares goes back into running and improving services.