Rail ticket prices are too high. One year's price freeze from the government is a good start, but it doesn't undo twenty years of above-inflation rises. We need to get back to basics and recognise that, to support commuters and deprived areas, and to help the environment, robust subsidies for rail and buses are essential. This is one thing that continental European countries tend to get right.
I support the government’s ongoing move to renationalise the railways gradually.
However, at the same time, cheap flights keep travel affordable, and help to grow our economy. We need a third runway at Heathrow, which is creaking at the seams, but we also need a robust and fair carbon pricing system that prices in the true environmental costs of those cheap flights. A market-based approach to climate change - neither the hair shirt politics of Ed Miliband, nor the "let it rip" policies of Nigel Farage. Climate change is not just theory for Clacton - through sea level rises, Tendring’s coastline is under threat in the long term.