NEW REPORT FINDS KHAN “DOUBLED FARE EVASION, HALVED ENFORCEMENT, AND BURIED DATA” ON LONDON UNDERGROUND SINCE COVID

Fact Evasion - Neil Garratt AM - July 2026.pdf

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A shocking new report by the City Hall Conservatives released today has revealed how, since Covid, fare evasion on the London underground has doubled - despite enforcement outcomes halving under Mayor of London Lord Khan, who they accuse of burying the data on the issue. 

The report’s author, Neil Garratt AM, Conservative Assembly Member for Croydon & Sutton, says the findings amount to “putting spin over reality” of our transport network under Lord Khan’s tenure. 

Among some of the most shocking discoveries is the consequences of fare evasion. Those caught ‘bumping the barriers’ are supposed to be issued an £100 fine, and those who fail to pay that fine are to be prosecuted. But the data that Mr Garratt has analysed suggests that since 2020, successful prosecutions for those who fail to pay the fine have declined from 29,113 cases to just 14,406. 

It also found how:

• TfL data on the issue has ceased being published, despite having been ordered to report quarterly on the scale of the issue in the past,

• Fare evasion has been successfully tackled before - falling from 3.1% in 2005 to 1.2% by 2014, staying at that rate until 2016 when it began to climb again. Today the figure is 3.5%, almost triple the rate Lord Khan inherited when he took office.

• In 2010 there were 500 enforcement staff on the TfL network. Despite increases in the size of the network, in 2026 there are still only 500 enforcement staff at TfL. 

• Lord Khan claims that figures suggest his anti-fare-evasion measures are working, despite data suggesting that overall evasion remained flat, and actually increased on the tube from 4.% to 5%.

  
  

The report comes almost a year after Thomas Turrell AM, Conservative Assembly Member for Bexley & Bromley and Conservative Transport Spokesman, published his report into fare evasion, which examined how the Mayor could meaningfully tackle the issue head-on.

Together, the reports paint an image of a city where fare evasion has tripled - visibly so - but the Mayor seems powerless to understand the scale of the issue, let alone confront it.

In a release, Mr Neil Garratt AM said:

“These findings lay bare the way Lord Khan puts spin ahead of reality in London. In 2016 he inherited a network that his two predecessors had fought tooth-and-nail to ensure people paid to use - and he rested on his laurels, refused to examine why TfL stopped reporting the data, and allowed this social degradation to fester to the highest it has ever been. This crime costs Londoners 190m a year in lost fares, which law-abiding commuters have to pay for instead. I don’t think anyone on a packed tube this morning will take comfort from the knowledge that this misery was completely preventable had London had a Mayor who actually cared about tackling the real issues.

My report shows londoners are right to think fate evasion spiralled out of control in the pandemic, and right to think the Mayor is doing little to tackle it. If he stopped putting spin over reality and tackled the problem, TfL's own record shows it can be fixed. But only by being honest about the scale of the problem.”