The Victorian government has recently announced that passengers under the age of 18 will get access to free public transport (as long as they hold the appropriate travel card). Although this is being heralded as a cost-of-living measure, I can’t help thinking it’s also about removing a section of “fare non-compliant” passengers from the books.

I’m not saying that under 18s are over-represented among fare dodgers and under-payers. The latest PTV data available does not give a demographic breakdown, but the average non-compliance is 4-5% across all transport formats and routes. Overall, buses have lower compliance rates, and since school students would likely account for a large proportion of weekday bus journeys, one might reasonably assume they form a significant component of fare non-compliance.

It will be interesting to see what the take up is for these free travel cards. Recent research shows that even where fares are as low as 50 cents, there is still a high level of non-compliance. My own very limited research (conducted recently while waiting to meet a passenger at my local train station) suggested that most of the passengers traveling without a valid ticket were young people, many of whom had just come from a match at the MCG (so they could afford a ticket for the game?) or were sporting the latest noise-cancelling headphones (again, they can afford Dr Dre but not a Myki?). Not all of these younger passengers were of school age, of course, but it was interesting to see the high preponderance of youth being waved through at the barrier.

Talking to station staff, it was clear that they have no choice but to let passengers enter/exit the gates even though they don’t hold a valid ticket. First, if stopped, there is every chance that a passenger will simply try to jump over the barrier, and if they hurt themselves in the process, the station staff will probably get the blame. Alternatively, if the passenger decides to kick their way through the gate and manages to break it, there is a greater inconvenience to other passengers (and the station staff will bear the brunt of that, too). Secondly, barrier staff are probably not trained to deal with potentially aggressive and violent fare-dodgers – it’s not worth the risk or the hassle. Better to let the Authorised Officers, armed with relevant powers, training and equipment to deal with ticket evaders.

Does any of this matter? After all, public transport is a utility for everyone; so what if 4-5% of users are non-compliant? That might be seen as a small price to pay if it means we all get to use a public service to get from A to B. But are the 10s and 100s of millions of dollars governments lose each year due to fare dodging a reasonable cost to the rest of society, and the vast majority of passengers who do the right thing? While access to public transport is a public good (even a public right, some would argue), it does not convey an entitlement, and comes with an individual cost, under a “user pays” principle. (But since public transport is underwritten by government funding and subsidies, couldn’t we argue that our rates and taxes have already paid for it, so we are entitled to use it for free? Well, under the same argument, drivers and vehicles shouldn’t have to pay to use public roads….)

There is an argument to be made that if something is made available for free, we may come to undervalue it (or take it for granted), causing us to treat it with less care and consideration than if we have paid for the privilege. On the other hand, from a passenger’s perspective, I might be less inclined to avoid paying if I felt that I was getting value for money, or that my user experience was much better than it often is. We have all experienced dirty or smelly vehicles, graffitied carriages, delayed, cancelled and overcrowded services, petty vandalism and anti-social behaviour when taking public transport. Seeing fare-evasion as part of a wider societal decline may seem an extreme stance – but lumped in with other petty crime and broader social ills, it can give rise to populist grievances that our political leaders ignore at their peril.

Public transport can never be 100% reliable or fail-safe (thanks to weather events, power outages and transport strikes). But from a user experience of train systems in places like Japan and Europe, I know it can be much better than it is here in Australia. Nationally, it feels like this particular public service is never going to be a top priority for our local, state or federal governments. It’s always a bit of an afterthought, and gets overlooked in the need to pander to car lobbyists, airline duopolies and the construction industries. Even where public money is being put into transport infrastructure and system upgrades, they always seem to take a lot longer to complete, and cost a lot more (and deliver a lot less) than we were promised.

You’re more likely to hear our politicians campaigning about fuel excise, road congestion, speed limits, EV concessions, extra airport runways, car parks, local car manufacturing (er, maybe not so much these days!), than about integrated transport hubs, high-speed intercity trains, and contactless ticketing systems.

It’s this attitude that reinforces the common notion that “Only losers take the bus…” (….and only bigger losers actually pay!).

Apologies to Fatima Mansions for the misappropriation for the title of this blog.