Liverpool City Region Combined Authority agree to no rise in Mersey Tunnel tolls for 2015/16

                                              

Following cross-party support for no rise in Mersey Tunnel tolls from councillors on the Merseytravel committee, councillors on the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority last week agreed with Merseytravel’s recommendation not to increase the tolls. Cllr Liam Robinson called on both Arriva and Stagecoach to “support local people” and “at the very least freeze their fares” in response to the news.

The Liverpool City Region Combined Authority went further than just agreeing with Merseytravel’s recommendation to not increase tolls this year and agreed to set up a task group to look into whether tunnel tolls could come down in future years. The task group would also call for a review of the Mersey Tunnels Act.

Cllr Phil Davies who seconded the motion creating the task group said, “I think it is timely that we do look at the whole arrangement, costing and pricing et cetera for the tunnel tolls because you know we seem to go through this annual process and it seems to inexorably increase year on year. So I do think it is a good idea to set up a task group where we can look at in-depth all of these issues and I think it’s absolutely again the timing is excellent in terms of the devolution agenda and that really plays into that and our asks.”

John McGoldrick of Mersey Tunnel Users Association, a campaign group who have long campaigned for the scrapping of tunnel tolls, “We were very pleasantly surprised at today’s decision to look again at the whole question of Tunnel’s financing and the level of tolls.”

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