TRAIN fares have gone up as figures show that services between Swindon and London are getting worse.

First Great Western, which serves Swindon on its routes between London Paddington and the South West and South Wales, introduced new prices on Sunday.

It also brought in changes to the timetable and increased the number of services between London, Cheltenham and Gloucestershire.

The company has put prices up by three per cent for standard tickets, five and a half for open tickets, and six per cent for first class .

But its most popular fares, including Saver First, Saver, SuperSaver and season tickets are unchanged.

The Liberal Democrats have accused the Swindon-based train operator of leaving passengers to suffer while an army of administrators is recruited.

Figures show that the number of managers and administration staff employed by the train operator grew by six per cent between 2000 and 2002.

But delays increased by 14.3 per cent over the same period, according to official statistics produced by the Government's Strategic Rail Authority (SRA).

First Great Western managing director Chris Kinchin-Smith said: "These limited fare rises will support our continuing investment in all areas, especially customer service, new trains, performance improvements and staff training."

In the middle six months of 2000, 24 per cent of trains operated by First Great Western were at least five minutes late. That figure had leapt to 38.3 per cent by 2002 the biggest rise of any of the 15 rail companies surveyed by the Lib Dems.

Don Foster, the Lib Dem transport spokesman, said: "In any other business, the reason for employing more management and administration staff is to improve efficiency and productivity. But in the rail industry, passengers are now paying for additional staff who seem incapable of making any impact on the reliability of day to day services."

First Great Western spokesman Tim Bowcock insisted the company was now successfully reducing delays after the problems caused by the track maintenance programme that followed the Hatfield crash.

He added: "These extra staff are not pen-pushers. They have been recruited to provide information and help for customers' refreshment and other services for passengers."

The Lib Dem figures were released ahead of a Rail Summit today, at which the train companies were set to be asked to explain increasing delays.

Virgin Cross Country is halving services north and south from Gloucester, but First Great Western is doubling services between Cheltenham, Gloucester, Stroud and London.