Passengers demand compensation for rail strike chaos

RAIL passengers facing the longest train strike in British history have demanded compensation in a furious letter to ministers.

A campaign group has written to Grant Shapps, the Transport Secretary, amid fears that thousands of travellers will not be entitled to any money back despite enduring a month of disruption. In the letter, seen by The Daily Telegraph, South Western Railway

Watch said compensation rules were “not fair or reasonable” and demanded that the Government intervene.

Staff at South Western Railway (SWR) are due to walk out for 27 days from Dec 2 in a long-running row over the role of guards on trains.

Earlier this week SWR began publishing details of emergency timetables, warning that many services will be cancelled. Under the national “Delay Repay” scheme, passengers cannot claim payouts for services disrupted by strike action if they are given fair warning. Compensation is only offered if trains running on the replacement timetables are delayed. But South Western Railway Watch claimed the scale of the planned disruption meant passengers should be allowed to claim back the cost of tickets.

In the letter to Mr Shapps, the group wrote: “If this industrial action does take place, rail users will only be able to claim for delays based on the amended timetables and these can seemingly be changed at any point prior to travel. This is not fair or reasonable and the Government must provide enhanced compensation for passengers most affected by these strikes.”

Workers are planning to walk out from Dec 2 to New Year’s Day – apart from polling day on Dec 12, and Christmas Day and Boxing Day, when trains will not run anyway.

SWR serves about 600,000 passenger journeys a day, linking London Waterloo to suburban stops in Greater

London and the Home Counties. Fresh talks between train bosses and the RMT union were held yesterday but failed to reach a breakthrough.

An SWR spokesman said: “We plan to run more than half of our normal Monday-friday services and will provide longer trains in order to increase capacity wherever possible. Customers can expect a similar number of peak services to previous strikes. However, they should be aware that last services will be earlier than normal.”