rail

Compare the following reports about the same story for a moment. Firstly the Dept of Transport press release

The majority of commuters will benefit from cheaper tickets from Saturday as most regulated rail fares drop in price.

The majority of rail journey fares are regulated by the Government. Increases to most fares are capped at 1% above inflation with the changes implemented in January, based on the previous July's RPI figure. Last July's RPI figure was -1.4%, so most regulated fares will now fall.

In August the Government also announced it had taken away the flexibility for operators to raise individual regulated fares by up to 5% above the national fare change, protecting passengers from unduly steep rises in future regulated fares.

And now the same story covered by the Guardian

Most rail passengers can look forward to a small one-off drop in fares in 2010 because of the low inflation rate, figures showed today.

Although some mainline passengers will face fare increases of up to 15% when new ticket prices apply from tomorrow, many will see fares fall by 0.4% because the annual rise for regulated fares, which include season tickets, is linked to the rate of inflation.

Virgin Trains is increasing its unregulated fares by an average of 2.8%, while ScotRail's rise is 3%.

"Turn up and go" fares on services run by the Southern train company will increase by 4%, and Southeastern passengers will see some unregulated fares rise by 7.3% and others by 2.8%.

A number of companies – including National Express East Anglia, First Capital Connect, TransPennine Express and Merseyrail – have frozen their unregulated fares.

The Association of Rail Operating Companies (Atoc) said fares would rise by an average of 1.1% in January.

I wonder why the Dept of Transport press release missed out that last statistic?