Ticketing and Concessionary Travel on Public Transport - United ...

Ev 32 Transport Committee: Evidence
Q261 Clive EVord: It is not just Victoria, is it? There
is a lot of stations. The Committee has actually been
to visit the London Underground <strong>and</strong> we have had
the health <strong>and</strong> safety processes described to us where
they have to count the number of people passing
through the ticket barriers to ensure they do not get
too many people going down.
Mr Verma: Chairman, I would not like to pretend
here that the only congestion we face on our network
is at the barriers. There is congestion at the barriers,
there is congestion on the platform, <strong>and</strong> there is
congestion on the trains, so there is congestion in a
number of diVerent places.
Q262 Clive EVord: So the argument about the speed
of ITSO is a bit overblown, is it not?
Mr Verma: I would not say that at all because there
is a number of places where the problem is entirely
at the barriers. There is no problem at the platforms.
Mr Burton: If we slow down the number of people
going through the barriers, that potentially just
transfers the problem to the front of the barriers. I go
through Victoria as well <strong>and</strong>, as you will have seen, a
lot of the congestion actually occurs—it does occur
on the platform as well, but it also occurs in the
ticket halls with people trying to get through the
barriers.
Q263 Clive EVord: Particularly when you stop them
going through.
Mr Burton: Yes, indeed, but there are moments
when getting people through would provide an
optimum crowd flow rather than stopping people at
the gate. So it gives us the flexibility to manage it,
which I think is quite important. Potentially, if we
slow down the throughput of people through the
gates then we would focus the problem on one side
of the gates. That is the issue.
Q264 Chairman: Only if you could not get them oV
the platforms. I think the trouble the Committee
face is that we are struggling a bit to underst<strong>and</strong> your
problems. We do sympathise, but if you are actually
going to use this as an argument then I think you
have to come up with something a little bit more
concrete.
Mr Verma: One very concrete example of this is we
sat in this room, the same committee room, for the
Crossrail Bill hearings where we heard the example
of Liverpool Street, where with the introduction of
Crossrail the congestion at Liverpool Street was all
concentrated on the London Underground ticket
halls <strong>and</strong> at the instruction of the Committee an
additional provision was introduced into the
Crossrail Bill to deal with that at a cost of £40
million. That is specifically a ticket gate line
problem. That has nothing to do with the London
Underground platforms. That is a very concrete
example a place where £40 million is having to be
spent because of congestion behind the gate lines.
Q265 Clive EVord: Oyster was introduced in 2002
<strong>and</strong> it is on all buses <strong>and</strong> London Underground, <strong>and</strong>
now some mainline railway stations?
5 December 2007 Mr Shashi Verma <strong>and</strong> Mr Steve Burton
Mr Verma: Yes, <strong>and</strong> the Dockl<strong>and</strong>s Light Railway.
Q266 Clive EVord: Who paid for the kit?
Mr Verma: The kit was procured through a PFI
contract. Eventually Transport for London ended
up paying for the kit through the PFI contract, but
it was financed by the PFI contractors.
Q267 Clive EVord: So the purchase of the equipment
on buses <strong>and</strong> its installation was all TfL on the
operators’ buses?
Mr Verma: All TfL, yes.
Q268 Clive EVord: So it is TfL’s equipment which is
on their buses. What degree of fare dodging is there
in London?
Mr Burton: On the figures we have, the average for
buses at the moment is 3.5% <strong>and</strong> the average for
London Underground/DLR is 3%.
Q269 Clive EVord: How do you monitor that?
Mr Burton: We do quarterly surveys.
Q270 Clive EVord: That is people out there with
clipboards, presumably?
Mr Burton: Yes.
Q271 Clive EVord: If I have got an Oyster card in my
pocket <strong>and</strong> I get on a bendy bus <strong>and</strong> I do not swipe
it, how do you know that I have got a valid ticket to
be on that bus?
Mr Burton: We have our revenue protection oYcers
who carry Oyster readers which will tell them how
the card has been used.
Q272 Clive EVord: And that is what happens? When
revenue protection oYcers go onto the buses they
will ask people for their Oyster card <strong>and</strong> swipe it to
see if it was swiped to get on that particular bus?
Mr Burton: Yes.
Q273 Chairman: How many revenue inspectors do
you have?
Mr Burton: There are 290 on the bus network, just
over 200 on the Underground network.
Q274 Chairman: Do they all work 24 hour shifts?
Mr Burton: They focus on day shifts because that is
when there is a lot of people travelling, but we do do
night shifts. We have a night shift which goes on
night buses.
Q275 Chairman: What spread of population would
you expect to cover?
Mr Burton: We check approximately 16 million
people on the buses every year.
Q276 Clive EVord: There has been a lot of publicity
recently around antisocial behaviour associated
with moving around on buses. Are TfL doing
enough to protect the public in terms of how public
transport is used to facilitate antisocial behaviour?
Mr Burton: We think we are. Obviously we are not
complacent about this <strong>and</strong> it is an issue which is
raised by our passengers. We are doing a number of