ANGRY councillors have joined forces in a last-ditch bid to prevent rail ticket offices from being scrapped.

Frinton and Walton town councillors have blasted rail bosses for proposing to shut down six ticket offices in Tendring, including Walton, Thorpe, Great Bentley, Alresford, Dovercourt and Harwich International.

Greater Anglia says ticket sales have fallen “well below” minimum levels set by the Department for Transport, so it does not have to provide ticket offices by law.

As the 14-day consultation period drew to a close on Monday, March 20, councillors made an 11th hour plea to keep their ticket stations open.

Councillor Delyth Miles said the closures would be “disastrous” and is seriously concerned about how it could impact the local area.

She said: “Transport is one of our key infrastructures and really now we’ve got to be on the right foot with this and be proactive as a council to really make noise.

“But I suspect the consultation is a joke because when I was in Walton station going to London on Monday they’ve already worked out where the new ticket machine is going to be. Well That made me even angrier and I should go out with placards on the street protesting.

“Let’s be proactive now and let’s rise in force objecting to this most strongly.”

Councillor Mark Platt said: “W At the end of the day we could end up having no ticket office between here and Colchester. It is all very well for the likes of us who could use our smartphones and book a ticket online, but a vast section of society can’t do that so we need to be fighting for them.”

Greater Anglia says all the ticket offices affected are served by trains with on-board conductors who can sell tickets to customers.

The company also says is it is installing tickets machine at all stations and upgrading existing ones to make them more user-friendly.

But councillor Nick Turner said: “It’s just dreadful and is once again chipping away at our quality of life. You can’t run these systems without people.”