Why? The answer lies with EU competition rules, which call for greater liberalisation of train services, and which Virgin sees as a major threat. So far only very small niche “Open Access” operators have taken advantage of this EU directive. These are commercially run ventures and don’t pay premiums back to government. And although these upstart operators run only a fraction of trains on the network, where they do fares have fallen by around 30 per cent, showing what real competition can achieve. On the London to York route where “Grand Central Railway” competes with Virgin, the fare is 47 per cent lower than to Manchester, where Virgin has the market to itself. A flexible first class Virgin train return ticket from London to Manchester is, from today, an eye watering £475, up from £134 in 1996.