Boris Johnson, at today’s London Assembly debate on the Mayor’s draft consolidated budget, agreed to carefully examine proposals put forward by the Liberal Democrat London Assembly Group on tackling fare evasion and the introduction of a one-hour ticket for bus use.
On fare evasion Caroline Pidgeon, the Liberal Democrat London Assembly Transport Spokesperson said:
“It is good news that the Mayor has accepted that far more should be done to tackle fare evasion across the whole transport network. Transport for London estimate that fare evasion is costing at least £70 million a year, which is a bill every honest traveller is paying through higher fares or a lack of investment in new transport.
“More expenditure on revenue inspectors would save significant amounts of money. Our proposals are based on the basic principle of invest to save. I hope Boris Johnson ignores the myth that fare evasion solely occurs on bendy buses and adopts our proposals to seriously drive down fare evasion across London.
On the proposed one-hour bus ticket Caroline Pidgeon said:
“If you can switch from tube to tube on the same ticket surely it makes sense to allow people to do the same with buses. At present people are penalised for using more than one bus on any journey. This is both unfair and in some cases a deterrent to people even using the bus.
“Other European cities recognise the benefits of time limited bus tickets and it is time the idea was adopted in London.
“Boris Johnson has already taken up the Liberal Democrat proposal to extend half price bus and tram travel to people on Job Seeker’s Allowance. The challenge to Boris Johnson is to go further and to adopt our sensible proposals to tackle fare evasion and time limited bus tickets.”