Bus fare cap - ongoing issue, merged posts

[whole diary]

[JayMac]

The plan was for the cap to rise to £2.50 from 1st November 2023. But that was scrapped and it was kept at £2 until 31st December 2024.

[Fourbee]

I had an email from Stagecoach on 26th June announcing price increases which came into effect on 1st July, including some single and return fares. Obviously if the £2 scheme ends then customers will be exposed to the higher prices in the new year. I've got no idea what the nominal fares would be for the journeys I could make as when I look them up they obviously come up as £2 at the moment. I will certainly be using the bus less if the scheme ends as some of the fares were way too high for me even before the unknown price rise last July.

[ChrisB]

From The Telegraph, via MSN

Rural communities are at risk of losing vital bus routes as Rachel Reeves prepares to scrap a £2 cap on fares.

The cap, introduced to encourage people to use public transport post-Covid, is to be raised or abolished outright in this month’s Budget, according to industry and Whitehall sources.

Ms Reeves has already ordered government departments to find savings as she scrambles to fill what she claims to be a £22bn black hole in the public finances.

While the impact of removing the cap, which costs the Treasury £350m a year, would most likely be marginal on short routes within cities, rural fares could jump by £10 or more.

That could leave people unable to afford to get to work, college or hospital, and reduce passenger numbers to such an extent that the future of some routes is thrown in doubt.

Silviya Barrett, the director of policy and research at the Campaign for Better Transport, said the £2 cap had breathed new life into the bus sector and should be extended, not abolished.

She said: “Taking the bus shouldn’t be a financial burden and raising the cap or scrapping it entirely could leave passengers struggling to afford travel on lifeline services.”

The Rural Services Network, which campaigns on behalf of residents of Britain’s 6,000 villages and 200 market towns, said rural poverty has depressed car ownership and left people reliant on the bus, many of whom will be left isolated if fares jump or services are cut.

Bus operators are understood to be largely resigned to the £2 cap being abandoned when it expires in December, and are pressing for it to be raised to no more than £2.50.

That would have little impact on the affordability of urban routes, it is argued, as nationwide bus prices countrywide averaged £2.47 before the cap was introduced in January 2023.

However, industry sources believe the ceiling will most likely be kept at that level for six months before being raised to £3 and then scrapped at the end of 2025.

While the Department for Transport (DfT^» (Department for Transport - about)) is said to favour a staged withdrawal, there are also concerns the Treasury could insist on abolishing the cap outright in this month’s Budget.

The Confederation of Passenger Transport, which represents a UK^▸ (United Kingdom) bus sector that carries 10m passengers a day, said it is vital that such a cliff-edge scenario be avoided.

Alison Edwards, its policy director, said: “Removing the cap overnight would be catastrophic for passengers and would have a knock-on effect on bus services.”

Ms Edwards said that the removal of the cap would also weigh heavily on discretionary travel such as bus-based tourism to the countryside and coast, which has seen a huge resurgence since Covid.

In North Yorkshire, where bus travel jumped 11pc last year, the cap has been credited with maintaining the viability of a host of rural routes. They include the Coastliner 840 service from Leeds to Whitby, which has been voted the most scenic in the UK.

If the cap is to be removed, Ms Edwards said it should be replaced with other measures to ease the burden on passengers, such as support for fares for younger people.

The House of Lords debated the cap last week, with Labour transport spokeswoman Baroness Blake hinting that the Government may put the onus on councils to fund fares, just as authorities in cities including London and Manchester already do.

She said: “The money going to local authorities is not ring-fenced; they are able to look at different schemes for their particular localities.”

The Department for Transport declined to comment.

So, basically, they're guessing.


Edit note: ChrisB, I've added one additional character to the very first of your post, simply to make your link work.  CfN.

[JayMac]

So, basically, they're guessing.

And that makes the thread title somewhat misleading. Perhaps add, "says The Telegraph"

[grahame]

So, basically, they're guessing.

Yes, but it might appear to be a slightly educated guess reading the smoke.  The flat fare gives the greatest benefit on longer more rural routes so was perhaps well tuned to woo voters in what were blue shires, and it would be convenient to dump the ire of it finishing onto the local authorities there.   There is probably a need to refactor / restructure and I do hope we don't end up with a complex system that varies across bus companies and LTA^▸ (Local Transport Authority) boundaries.

[Ralph Ayres]

The cap was never going to be sustainable long-term, as well as being a blunt tool not catering particularly well for example for people who had to use more than one bus for their journey. Cynically, I wonder if the implementers were fairly sure that withdrawing it would be someone else's problem.  I'm not convinced that it is maintaining the viability of a host of rural routes. There may well be more people travelling and it's helped people on lower incomes, but the overall revenue for the bus operators hasn't gone up significantly if at all; as I understand it that's pretty much how the reimbursement from the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) is meant to work. 

Ideally a cap of some sort needs to stay in place just long enough to allow a far better scheme to support and encourage bus use to be designed and implemented.

[Electric train]

The cap was never going to be sustainable long-term, as well as being a blunt tool not catering particularly well for example for people who had to use more than one bus for their journey. Cynically, I wonder if the implementers were fairly sure that withdrawing it would be someone else's problem.  I'm not convinced that it is maintaining the viability of a host of rural routes. There may well be more people travelling and it's helped people on lower incomes, but the overall revenue for the bus operators hasn't gone up significantly if at all; as I understand it that's pretty much how the reimbursement from the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) is meant to work. 

Ideally a cap of some sort needs to stay in place just long enough to allow a far better scheme to support and encourage bus use to be designed and implemented.

I agree that "the cap" was intended to be a temporary measure.  In this country there has been a fixation that public transport should be self financing ie without support from the public purse.
If we the UK^▸ (United Kingdom) public want to have effective public transport that supports rural areas drives car usage then public transport will need support from the public purse, there should be a move to private companies paid on a contract with service level obligations model and not a franchise model which only seems to fund the bubbly at share holders meetings

[grahame]

The cap was never going to be sustainable long-term ...  [snip]

Ideally a cap of some sort needs to stay in place just long enough to allow a far better scheme to support and encourage bus use to be designed and implemented.

I agree that "the cap" was intended to be a temporary measure.  In this country there has been a fixation that public transport should be self financing ie without support from the public purse.

And there you have the problem - how do you translate the economic case for the area served and all the public good done by public transport into a financial case in which the balance sheet for operating the service including any renewal an maintenance covers its costs at the least.

With the £2 bus fare being questioned, and with the winter fuel allowance being means tested, do members feel that there is a risk of other schemes that help people who are above the safety net - such as the ENCTS^▸ (English National Concessionary Travel Scheme) scheme - being curtailed, dropped, means tested, having a fixed (£2  ) charge per journey added, being limited to journeys starting in your own authority, etc.

[TaplowGreen]

The cap was never going to be sustainable long-term ...  [snip]

Ideally a cap of some sort needs to stay in place just long enough to allow a far better scheme to support and encourage bus use to be designed and implemented.

I agree that "the cap" was intended to be a temporary measure.  In this country there has been a fixation that public transport should be self financing ie without support from the public purse.

And there you have the problem - how do you translate the economic case for the area served and all the public good done by public transport into a financial case in which the balance sheet for operating the service including any renewal an maintenance covers its costs at the least.

With the £2 bus fare being questioned, and with the winter fuel allowance being means tested, do members feel that there is a risk of other schemes that help people who are above the safety net - such as the ENCTS^▸ (English National Concessionary Travel Scheme) scheme - being curtailed, dropped, means tested, having a fixed (£2  ) charge per journey added, being limited to journeys starting in your own authority, etc.

I could certainly see the universal free bus pass being means tested in the same way as the Winter Fuel Payment.

[ChrisB]

Don't forget that its also available to those with a disability, regardless of age.

[infoman]

May the Government might fudge the issue and withdraw the cap in large populated areas.

But retain it in the country areas,just a thought.

[grahame]

May the Government might fudge the issue and withdraw the cap in large populated areas.

But retain it in the country areas,just a thought.

There was a suggestion at one point, wasn't there, that the cap was to go up to £2.50 but that was not done and I wonder if it's because a general election was coming up.

If I was Rachel Reeves (for clarity, I am NOT) and if she was to listen to me (I'm sure she has better things to do), I would consider stepping up the cap at (say) a pound a year until it reached £5, from that point perhaps leaving it in place rather like it being a "regulated fare" ... and giving some help to those who, with some contention I suspect, we could describe as the "rural poor".    The balancing act is between a poorly targeted subsidy and a cost so much higher / spiking upwards that people don't use the buses, and a 'take' of £3 or £4 is far better than an empty seat bringing in £0.

[RichardB]

I think this is just mischief making by the Telegraph.  Buses ae a big priority for the new Government so I think it is extremely unlikely the cap would simply be scrapped.  I can see the previously announced increase to £2.50 happening but then I can also see them sticking to the £2 too.

We'll see soon enough in the Budget.

[Fourbee]

Just announced that the cap will be £3 throughout 2025:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/c079nmk0rd5t

Starmer says new £3 cap on bus fares will be announced this week

The PM is now asked about scrapping a £2 cap on bus fares in England, rumoured to be included in the Budget.

Starmer says the Tories only funded this capped fare to the end of 2024.

He says he understands how reliant many people are on this cap, particularly in rural England and announces that there will be a new £3 cap fare until 2025 announced this week

(From a live BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) feed)

[JayMac]

Excellent news. A sustainable increase for the government and not too great a price shock for bus users.