LETTER: Rail dispute is at all time low

The current Southern Rail dispute has now plumbed new depths for beleaguered passengers on the Marshlink service - in my case from Rye to Ashford.
By The Newsroom
Published 8th Jan 2017, 13:00 BST
Updated 9th Jan 2017, 13:01 BST

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Keyboard SUS-160615-124004001Keyboard SUS-160615-124004001
Keyboard SUS-160615-124004001

Although past and future strike days have been well publicised, for the last two days (December 29/30) Rye has been without any train service at all.

Even worse is that the replacement buses that were laid on for the morning of the 29th simply vanished along with the train service for the rest of the day (barring the last train which ran at the end of the day without prior notice).

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This effectively left passengers who travelled out in the morning stranded for their return journeys.

These two days of almost complete service suspension, along with the unannounced cancellation of the weekday shuttle services between Rye and Ashford in the morning and evening peaks mean that Marshlink stations have now no viable train services at all.

This appalling situation simply cannot carry on.

What on earth are our local MPs doing about this?

It doesn’t surprise me that Amber Rudd is keeping schtumm on all this as she no doubt feels she has more important things to be dealing with. But she’s not the only one. Rail users pay extortionate amounts for this facility (I cannot refer to it as a service any more) - in my case £6,152 a year. It is affecting people’s livelihoods, jobs and quality of life to a totally unacceptable degree.

May I suggest that Southern restores their entire network back to how it was before this all kicked off and then get together with unions and government (as they are clearly involved) to get it all resolved without this disruption?

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Finally it is vital that affected passengers apply for the delay repay that Southern is duty bound to provide for all these cancelled trains. This also applies to the shuttle services that they have removed from the timetable and also those with replacement buses.

Gary James

Cedar Close

Northiam

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Related topics:RyeSouthern RailMPs