Some of the commuters who responded to Mr Kemp’s post said passengers should not have to “play the system” of planning far in advance or travelling at inconvenient times to get cheaper fares.
In 2011, Sir Roy McNulty’s report, external on rail value for money and the West Coast franchise process warned that pricing was “extremely complex”.
A decade later, the Department for Transport’s Great British Railways plan, external highlighted that railways were “too fragmented, too complicated, and too expensive to run”.
The plan’s authors, then-Transport Secretary Grant Shapps and former Royal Mail chairman Keith Williams, said in 2023 that the Covid-19 pandemic had also had a major impact on the railways and passenger numbers.
For many business people like Mr Kemp though, the need to travel at a reasonable price has not gone away.
“The incentive to stay in this country to do business is not there,” he said.
“I could go and get clients in Spain and go and see them once a week cheaper than I could go and see clients in London.”
