I read Joanna Smith's letter (Wirral Globe, 27 October) on her journey with Merseyrail with interest and dismay. I am sorry that she felt threatened by another passenger as she travelled from Eastham to Moreton. She asks us to do something about it using the money generated by the introduction of the Penalty Fare scheme. That is exactly what we are doing because we agree with her that personal security on the network is priority number 1!

The Penalty Fare scheme is not intended to make us a profit, quite the contrary: when we introduced the scheme we promised that all the money raised from fines would go straight back into the system for further security enhancements. And we are sticking to our word. We have installed electronic ticket barriers at the major stations on the network (including Hamilton Square) and have changed the way we deploy security staff and Ticket Inspectors. We have in fact increased the number of security staff from a handful to 30. Passengers are seeing a much greater security presence on our stations and our trains to stop those people who behave in an anti-social and threatening way causing a nuisance to the vast majority of decent, fare paying passengers.

Although the Penalty Fare scheme, the electronic gates and the extra security presence have only been in place for a few weeks, we already see a marked reduction in the number of incidents across the network. Together with the British Transport Police and our private security firm CFS, we are determined to do everything we can to make Merseyrail as safe and secure as humanly possible. We want passengers like Ms Smith to use our services and to feel safe when doing so.

Yours sincerely,

Rudi Boersma

Concession Development Manager

Merseyrail