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METRO passengers got a shock this morning when the Director General of Nexus Mike Parker hit the system’s busiest station carrying an enormous £20 note. Mr Parker was at Monument to highlight the fact that the penalty fare for fraudulent Metro travel has doubled to £20 after a highly successful lobbying exercise from Nexus. (The new penalty fare came into effect at midnight Monday May 2) Nexus had argued for years that the previous £10 fine didn’t go far enough to dissuade people from riding without a ticket on the Metro. Now, say Nexus bosses, the new fine will hit fraudsters where it hurts. Mike Parker, said "We have argued that the £10 fare was simply not a sufficient deterrent to dissuade people from fare evasion. This change from the Government, which followed extensive consultation, gives us that stronger deterrent when tackling fare evaders and we applaud it." Councillor David Wood, Chairman of the PTA, said "This is good news and we welcome it. The PTA and Nexus have worked hard to make the case to Government in recent years. Raising the penalty fare demonstrates that the Government have listened to local people." Transport Minister, Tony McNulty, recently announced that fare dodgers on the railways will in future be subject to a minimum penalty fare of £20.00 - double the existing fine. The new regime comes into force on May 3. Fare evasion costs the Tyne and Wear Metro hundreds of thousands of pounds each year and Nexus has comprehensive anti fraud strategies in place to combat fare evaders. Each month Nexus pursues prosecutions against fraudsters through the courts. Announcing the decision Tony McNulty said "It is estimated that hundreds of millions of pounds are lost to the industry each year through people who deliberately choose not to pay their fare. Such behaviour is clearly unfair to the vast majority of honest fare paying passengers. "The current £10 penalty is no longer enough to deter the persistent cheats who routinely seek to travel without buying a ticket. I am therefore pleased to announce that following an extensive consultation exercise, the minimum penalty fare will now increase to £20.00. "This sends a clear signal of the Government's willingness to tackle fare dodging on the railways and I hope it will act as a deterrent to anyone thinking of travelling without paying the correct fare." The new fine will apply to all the train operating companies that operate a penalty fare scheme. It is estimated that over £200 million a year is lost to the rail industry nationally from fare evasion. As well as recovering some of this lost revenue, increasing the penalty fare may also have social benefits in reducing the crime of fare evasion.
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