LIVING in a celebrity-obsessed culture does have its downsides. We may never know whether the six young people who appeared in court charged with train fare dodging - four men and two women - have ever entertained the idea of being on a TV reality show, but they have certainly achieved a fame of sorts.

Thanks to the Central Trains' enthusiasm for catching non-payers, this unhappy band now find their names in rogues' galleries at stations around Birmingham. Unfortunately for them, this is not all. For they were ordered to pay a total of £1,066.90 in fines, costs and compensation. The cost of the original fares, between them, came to just £16.90.

By any stretch of the imagination, this is hardly cost-effective. We wonder at the mentality of people who thought they could get away with such penny-pinching frauds. Presumably, the sight of the inspector slowly advancing down the carriage held no fears for them as they sat ticket-less and pretending to admire the Worcestershire landscape as it sped by.

Indeed, we can only imagine the awful moment of reckoning when the excuses fell like discarded cartons on to the track and it became clear that the good servant of Central Trains wasn't exactly born yesterday and was having none of it.

This newspaper has been critical of railway operators in the past. But on this occasion, we're right behind Central Trains' determination to put a stop to fare-dodging, for anything that protects the honest citizen is fine in our book. And to the dodgers, we would just say this - there is always a price to be paid for fame.