Train fares ‘will increase 25% in next four years’ unless funding rules are torn up: Labour call for cap on price rises and simplified ticket structure Daily Mail

  Rail fares are on course to soar by about a quarter over the next four years

  Will rise by up to 5.6% next year - total increase of 24% since last election

  Labour calling for reform of 'broken market' including capping of fare rises 

  Shadow Transport Secretary: 'Our rail fares are among highest in Europe'

Rail fares are on course to soar by a quarter over the next four years unless funding rules are torn up, Labour will warn today.

Official figures released this morning are expected to show that rail fares will rise by up to 5.6 per cent next year.

The Campaign for Better Transport (CBT) said this would take the total increase to 24.7 per cent since the last election.

And Shadow Transport Secretary Mary Creagh will warn that fares will rise by a further 24 per cent by 2018 unless existing rules are changed.

Although annual rail fare increases are implemented in January they are based on Retail Price Index figures from the previous July. Under current rules, regulated train fares will rise by RPI plus 1 per cent.

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A hero for our time: Inspired by the man who built his own toll road? He's one of countless Britons rising up to solve problems the State's too useless to fix Daily Mail

1.      Businessman Mike Watts spent £150,000 of his own money to build toll

2.    It was after part of the A431 in Kelston, Somerset collapsed and closed

3.     He took matters in own hands to solve chaos caused by 14-mile diversion

4.    Mr Watts has shown up council 'jobsworths' who say road can't be fixed

The businessman who has built his own toll road around a road closure in Somerset should be knighted in the next honours’ list. He is an inspiration.

By taking matters into his own hands to solve the chaos caused by a 14-mile diversion on a busy commuter route, Mike Watts has set a shining example to anyone who has ever moaned about public services.

Faced with months of roadworks and upheaval, and the loss of business at the party supplies shop he runs with his wife Wendy in Bath, the pioneering  52-year-old didn’t just complain.

He put his money and his effort where his mouth is, rented a nearby field and built an alternative road to allow traffic to bypass the closure, charging drivers £2 each way.

He spent £150,000 on the gravel track next to the A431 in Kelston and says he will probably spend that again to maintain it. He says he only wants to break even before December when the council is due to re-open the proper road, which was closed after a landslip.

Of course, the council has been quick to question his efforts, citing that mealy-mouthed old staple — health and safety. 

Rather than thanking him, they’ve subjected Mr Watts to all sorts of snooty checks and inspections. Well, they must be furious. They have been utterly humiliated by him.

Mike Watts, British Hero

Businessman sets up private toll road just 340 yards long charging motorists £2 a time to bypass closed section of main road.