THE father of a student who travels by bus to York College from Ryedale claims youngsters have been unfairly penalised by “excessive” fare hikes.

From Sunday, Yorkshire Coastliner, which operates services from the Yorkshire coast through Ryedale, York and Tadcaster to Leeds, made the decision to raise fares for some of its passengers.

In the past, students travelling from Malton to York got a half-fare concession, priced £16.50 for a weekly pass, but the changes mean that now students only get a third off the adult rate at £23.30 – an increase of £6.80 or about 41 per cent.

Nick McNally, whose daughter Carol, 18, makes the journey from Malton to the college said the changes are unfairly targeting the young. Coastliner has attributed the rise to increased running costs and said the decision to review the child discount was not taken lightly.

Mr McNally said: “I think it’s pretty disgusting that Coastliner has made the decision to impose excessive fares on students trying to get to college. The changes were brought in very quickly and just before the bank holiday so a lot of people didn’t know about them. There were students on the bus my daughter was on that didn’t have the money.”

Nigel Eggleton, the company’s marketing director, said: “We have reduced the level of discount available to children and that’s not been an uncommon trend in the industry.

“The cost of carrying a child is the same as carrying anyone else and as our cost base increases particularly relating to fuel, so we had to make the difficult decision to raise fares for younger people.”

Other fares that have changed include singles from York to Tadcaster, which went up by ten pence to £3.30 and singles from York to Claxton Lane End, Claxton, went up by ten pence to £3.30.

Meanwhile, a single from Copmanthorpe to Whitby has gone up by ten pence to £10.50.

The overall increase in fares is under three per cent.

There was no change to fares for journeys in York and the price of a single from York to Malton will remain unchanged.