A campaign has been launched to fight plans to close the ticket offices at Penzance and St Erth train stations. 

Passengers, residents, rail enthusiasts, councillors and campaigners were due to protest at Penzance Train yesterday. (Tuesday) 

The ticket offices are among many that are earmarked to close around the country following the launch of a public consultation on how tickets are sold at stations in the future.   

West Cornwall’s MP Derek Thomas and Cornwall councillor Andrew George are now calling on people to take in the survey to help save the ticket offices. 

Subject to consultation, the proposal is that ticket office staff would transition to multi-skilled roles. This would, according to GWR,  allow staff to help more customers with a wider range of issues, including helping them to buy tickets, wherever they are on the station.   

This will, however, mean changes to how station teams are organised, and some ticket offices will close as the new roles are introduced.  

Cllr George said: “Plans to close rail ticket offices throughout the country - including ours at Penzance and St Erth - is the inevitable consequence of Conservative policy and could be stopped by Conservative Ministers, if they chose.  

“I’m calling on all local passengers, rail enthusiasts, councillors and campaigners to back the campaign to fight these plans.  

“I understand Penzance could close before the end of the year.  

“The plans are based on a fiction dreamt-up by remote and out-of-touch managers who have a naive faith in the infallibility of technology; that ’smart’ systems, ‘apps’ and their IT systems can can be easily navigated by all passengers.  

“The reality is very different. People need people, not AI bot-managed systems to speak to. “They seem to deliberately design ambiguity and customer frustration into their systems, create a set of inappropriate FAQ backup answers, which are irrelevant to the problems people encounter, and of course they don’t advise on the most cost-effective way to get from A to B.  

“Of course Conservative MPs in marginal seats will be desperately trying to distance themselves from this appalling policy - backed as it is by Conservative Transport Ministers. “And others will run campaigns merely to harvest emails to bolster their election campaigns.  

“The campaign must grow and quickly.” 

Derek Thomas MP conducted a survey when the threat first emerged regarding Penzance Ticket Office.  

Eighty per cent of people said they bought their tickets from Penzance ticket office, with just 16% going online and an overwhelming 97% supported Derek’s campaign to keep the ticket office open.   

More than 60% of train users told him they used the service to visit friends and family and for leisure, with just 11% using the train for commuting.   

Derek wrote to Mark Hopwood Managing Director of Great Western Railway to share these findings and was given an assurance in December 2022 that the ticket office would not be closed.   

But Derek believes the fight is not yet won for Penzance so he is appealing once again for public support to save the Penzance ticket office.   

Derek Thomas MP said: “I recognise that at some stations on the GWR service closing tickets offices may be justified. This is particularly the case in stations used mainly by commuters where the vast majority of tickets are purchased online, but I know from experience that Penzance Ticket Office is different and must be preserved.’  

Approximately 700 tickets are sold on average each week in Penzance, and many purchased by people who value the help ticket office staff provide when planning a journey and understanding connections. Derek believes there is a strong argument against closing the ticket office as Penzance Ticket Office serves a different demographic where 34% of tickets are sold at the station compared with just 12% at Exeter St David’s.   

Derek Thomas added: ‘We are working so hard to increase the use of public transport over private cars and this effort will be frustrated if we make travelling by train more difficult to access due to the closure of dedicated ticket offices. This is likely to lead to fewer journeys taken from Penzance which is the opposite to what is needed by GWR and The Department for Transport.’  

“GWR managers have committed to working with me. Penzance has a higher ratio of tickets sold at the station than both Exeter St David’s and Plymouth - we have demonstrated the need for dedicated ticket office staff at Penzance and I expect GWR and the Transport Department to take this seriously.’  

For details of the plans for each station affected, and details of how to take part in the consultation through Transport Focus please go to the website www.GWR.com/haveyoursay  

All feedback must be received by Wednesday, July 26 2023.