The consultation document has to be published in a form accessible to persons in the area covered by the scheme.
I think it is clear that for Greater Manchester there will be a public consultation exercise.
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Greater Manchester Bus Franchising Assessment
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The consultation document has to be published in a form accessible to persons in the area covered by the scheme.
I think it is clear that for Greater Manchester there will be a public consultation exercise.
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I think so too. Though as I read it, when the consultation takes place, the question, if anyone is really taking it seriously, of franchising or quality partnerships will already have been decided and presumably the shape of the franchising scheme will as well, because the audit will need to have something concrete to assess.
No doubt the audit will take many months, if not years, though, so a public consultation is some way off.
WatcherZero
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Gathering a large positive mandate from the public consultation will be vital evidence to prove the case for reform.
e.g. "90% of the public consulted agreed with the aims and objectives of our proposals and 80% with the specific proposals set out, only 20% believed that the alternative industry proposals put forward offered a realistic or desirable improvement."
e.g. "90% of the public consulted agreed with the aims and objectives of our proposals and 80% with the specific proposals set out, only 20% believed that the alternative industry proposals put forward offered a realistic or desirable improvement."
Unless I'm very much mistaken there is no suggestion that the industry will put forward any alternative proposals. Surely if they wanted to change the way they operated their business, they would do!
Robertj21a
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I'm rarely convinced that any public consultation on such matters is of much use. Only a very small % of the public would take part, a proportion will already love or hate public transport, and their views can be easily swayed by the actual wording used in any papers or presentation. It just becomes a 'tick box' exercise to show that something was done.
In any event, putting local politicians in charge of anything to do with public transport is not my idea of progressive thinking.
Approved by who? If you mean Central Government then that would prove very "interesting", given that Bus Reform was a major factor in persuading the GM local authorities that they must have an elected Mayor. Irrelevant of the local media's general antithosis to buses, they have recorded this fact for all to see. Consequently, a rejection by Grayling (or any successor) will prove that Central Government are liars and cheats. Don't forget, the current Tory Government already have "previous" for this, when Hammond ripped up the signed, sealed and on the point of delivery 2010/1 KickStart programme. I wonder what he spent the £530,000 he saved on? 8 months Westminster Hospitality, probably.
What IS your idea of progressive thinking?
Coincidentally, I uncovered a taxi receipt from almost 10 years ago for a typical journey someone without a car might take; Town Centre supermarket to home with heavy shopping. I then went on to the local taxi company's website and worked out how much the same journey should cost today. I also checked the Bank Of England website's inflation indicator; uncovered a Stagecoach Manchester fare table for exactly the same month, and also tried to compare fuel prices. The latter being less scientific as the 2008 figure was the national average, wheras the current figure is based on diesel prices at the pumps at (a different) local Supermarket.
The following were the results over the last 10 years:
General Inflation: +27%
Diesel prices: +5%*
Taxi fare: +12%
Bus fare: +78%
(albeit Return=DaySaver and weekly MegaRider have gone up "only" 50%)
* Admittedly, fuel prices were up and down in 2008 with a peak in the Summer, but even at their lowest the increase would only be in the teens/low 20s percent.
One, slightly worrying aspect - which adds to the point I'm about to make - is that looking at both the local taxi company's website and a taxi industry comparison website; neither quote the taxi pick up point at the Supermarket entrance. They both quote the nearest BUS stop!
My point is that, so far, uber is in its infancy and I don't know if Gett is well known outside city boundaries like Manchester, but if I was sat in California running one of these multi trillion dollar "app" based taxi firms, I would be looking to wipe out the UK bus business where the fares gap is already closing rapidly.
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The word "consultation" is widely misunderstood. "Consultation" is not the same as "negotiation". Whenever there is a consultation, the people doing the consultation are almost certainly going to go ahead with whatever they were planning. They may however alter certain aspects if, in the opinion of the people doing the consultation, the representations improve on the original plan.
There seems to be an unnecessarily complicated process to be followed taking many years.
There seems to be an unnecessarily complicated process to be followed taking many years.
Perhaps this has something to do with bus companies having the burden of employing people, minimum wage rates, working time directives, national insurance contributions, pension contributions, employment laws, disabled access vehicles, compulsory driver training, compulsory ENCTS carriage at derisory rates, 'O' licences, route registration compliance, health & safety, drivers hours laws and others - much of which only peripherally touches the taxi industry.
Approval I believe will be by the mayor; who in this acts in a quasi-judicial capacity.
The minister is not involved. Of course, the mayor's approval can be challenged in judicial review - for example if the mayor disregards an adverse finding of the auditor that the statutory requirements of the assessment have not been met - but essentially, so long as the auditor says the right numbers have been included, and that they add up, it is for the mayor to make a decision on the basis of the evidence of the respective assessments.
The vast majority of these aren't new - or, I daresay on the increase - since 2008. They are employing less non-driving staff than ever. First got rid of all on road supervision in Spring 2017 and from my obs, Stagecoach have followed suit. I'm confident all the majors paid more than the current legal minimum to drivers before 2008, although it is clear that wage increases have nowhere near kept up with fares over the last 32 years, never mind 10! If they had, bus drivers in GM would be on at least £50 an hour. I believe ENCTS re-imbursement in GM is better than average even as a percentage. And as it is a percentage the actual figure will obviously be pretty high per operating unit. Additionally, less and less people qualify for ENCTS as life expectancy is not keeping pace with the increase in retirement age. Not sure what you mean by "route registration compilance" unless its investment in computer systems and RTI - which is incorrect anyway as Stagecoach's always underestimates journey times. My local route always shows its expected in Manchester 4 minutes early, irrelevant of how late the bus is when it gets to my stop and subsequent stops towards the city. What I do know is that Operators are wasting fortunes in forever changing the *same* registered timetables every couple of months to either cope with perceived increases in running times or - worse still - changing timing points so that they are *not* consistent with other services on common stretches of route.
Apart from all these individual points, there is one overriding point that completely shoots down the Operators' argument, and that is - as I've said before on other threads - the massive difference in fares between routes for identical journey types/lengths.
TheGrandWazoo
Veteran Member
There are some major additional issues
- Driver CPC - introduced 2009/10 has added another level of bureaucratic burden and cost
- Reduction of BSOG by 20% in 2012 - a substantial factor in fare increases
- Additional costs from Euro emissions (e.g. adblue)
ENCTS remuneration may be better in GM than Cheshire (for instance) but the calculation guidance drives a behaviour across the country that has seen "walk on" fares increase disproportionately whilst promoting weekly (and longer) travel tickets. In that respect, a Megarider offers exceptional value IF you're making journeys 3 to 5 days a week (e.g. travelling to work) but not for the occasional.
I would not say exceptional value as £15 a week still equates to 80 or 90 .mIles worth of fuel for the motorist. That in turn is around 12 hours on the bus compared to barely half that driving. And my last "overriding" point is still not being answered.
TheGrandWazoo
Veteran Member
How can you ignore all the other costs for motorists and claim a valid comparison? Stagecoach’s cost is an all up cost whilst just the fuel cost ignores the VED, Insurance, Depreciation, Servicing, Tyres.
As for your “over-riding argument”....? That there is inconsistency on fare scales? A reflection on competing modes (e.g. train or tram) or historic competition (being skewed by events in the past) or just anomalies?
Not sure it proves anything.
The vast majority of people making this decision have a car anyway. Only the marginal cost of driving it is relevant - VED, insurance, MOT etc have to be paid anyway. Most people haven't a clue how much wear and tear costs per mile, so if your employer provides parking or your destination is not the city centre, the only cost of motoring to consider is fuel. It doesn't matter that the bus operator has to pay for everything else, the alternative cost is just fuel.
TheGrandWazoo
Veteran Member
If people already have cars and it’s only fuel to pay for, they are unlikely to consider the bus anyway.
Put it the other way round, it would cost me £6 to go from Bath to Bristol return - a distance of 24 miles. A weekly ticket drops that down to £4.40 (based of 5 days). Pay monthly, in advance by DD, I can get it down to £3.80 a day.
The car would only cost (based on just fuel) £3.50. In that respect, you’d never be able to compete so it’s a hopeless comparison.
CPC costs about £100 a day per driver every year.Comparing buses and taxis is not ok .Taxis dont carry passengers and someone decides how much the fare should be .One thing we tend to forget is the cost of new buses which .2018 prices a hybrid bus you are looking at 280 000 to 300 000 pounds a simple Double decker from 230 000 to 250 000.A single decker about 100 000 to 180 000 where as the cost og cars has been constant.ENCTS payments have gone down but they still expect the same service.How many here actually run a bus company.
158756 has elequently answered the point about costs whilst your reply also back my belief that you will never reduce traffic whilst pursuing policies which effectively force people to acquire cars. The fare iniqualities are not historical btw They have mainly sprung up in the last 3-4 years
I t is obviously an ethical argument but I find it totally unacceptable.
TheGrandWazoo
Veteran Member
You are comparing apples with apricots.
It is fair to say that once people have cars, having made that initial capital purchase and assumed all the other standing costs (on a two year old Ford Focus, that comes to c.4k a year) that they will be inclined to use them - sweating their asset and so incurring the alleged marginal cost.
You might wish to have a look at this https://www.ippr.org/files/images/m...2012/08/war-on-motoring-myth_Aug2012_9542.pdf and some little nuggets
- "Taking motoring costs as a whole (purchase and running costs), between 1997 and 2011 the cost of motoring rose less than the cost of living – in real terms the total cost of motoring went down by 5 per cent.
- While insurance costs, taxes for less fuel-efficient cars, fuel and maintenance may have gone up significantly during this time, purchase costs have decreased considerably in real terms, so that overall costs have fallen.
- Up until a few years ago, both purchase and running costs had fallen in real terms; it is now 18 per cent cheaper to run a car now than it was 20 years ago"
The bus industry doesn't want to have support in handouts but in terms of measures that DO level the playing field. Parking place levies, decent bus priority, traffic enforcement etc are the sort of things. The sort of thing that actually gives buses some equality/advantages in terms of variable costs and time performance.
As for your fare variations, I still fail to see how that is any sort of clincher as to whatever point you are trying to make.
Apart from the fact that one of the corridors in GM with the cheaper fares just happens to have the newest (now 15 months old) 'deckers allocated to it and neighbouring routes, these arguments are still missing the point. However much costs have gone up and however much running costs are for bus companies, they are broadly the same if the network comprises routes virtually identical in average speeds etc. There is virtually no wage differential between routes (not at Stagecoach, anyway) there is no difference in the amount being paid for fuel for identical type buses on one route/corridor compared to another.
Comparing buses and taxis IS OK for the very reasons I stated previously - and I don't understand what you mean by "Taxis don't carry passengers". The long term intent of the "app" based industry is clear. Apart from quoting fares from bus stops - I'll remind you it is illegal to park/pick up on a bus stop unless you are driving a bus on a service registered to stop there, or are an emergency vehicle attending to an emergency - when uber first moved into Bolton, their press release didn't quote a fare of £5 from Bolton to Farnworth, it quoted Bolton *Bus Station* to Farnworth. We already have low quality threshold taxis from such as Rossendale and Wolverhampton running around Manchester and uber (and presumably Gett) have the political/economic power to ride roughshod over UK law - witness uber eats (and Deliveroo tbf) cyclists forever using pedestrian only areas such as the concourse at Piccadilly Station (right under the noses of a permanent Police prescence!) when delivering to the Leon restaurant/take away and other outlets.
And then there is the bus industry giving away custom to taxis by driving past intending passengers as happened to my brother last night. Although this has always been a common complaint regarding First, this is the first occasion under Stagecoach stewardship that I or a member of my family have experienced this - certainly involving a Hyde Road depot service. Thus, is this another sign of the company's deterioration.
Robertj21a
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Personally, I'm amazed it's only £15 for a whole week. That's really good !.
Yes, £15 is great if you are travelling 70 or more miles a week, but it is also the same fare for 8-20 miles a week (if spread across 4 days). The fare variations prove a postcode lottery through a captive* market in what I and most people STILL believe should be a public service. And the fare variations are only part of the story as services on the premium rate, captive market routes were cut to resource the bus wars.
On the other side of the coin, if bus operating costs are so high, how can you make a profit charging £3 return for journeys of about 11 miles (Swinton to Manchester) with observed (off-peak) and anecdotal reported (peak) loadings averaging less than 20 pax? And just as relevant; WHY? if its not creating dividends to the shareholders.
*Captive market in this instance due to pre-existing low car ownership rates with no other realistic alternative - until the taxi industry cottons on more strategically.
edwin_m
Veteran Member
Uber and the like are highly subsidised because their shareholders view them as technology companies and exempt them from the usual expectation of making a profit. So it's unlikely that their current price levels will be sustainable in the long term unless they achieve driverless operation, which takes out their major operating cost. Like the other big names on the web they also exploit this subsidy, plus their low levels of regulation and taxation, to drive the competition out of business in the hope of achieving something close to a monopoly before the regulators catch up. The question is how well the bus network can survive this challenge, particularly where local authorities don't have the funds to defend them and may not have the inclination either where the they have virtually no control over the buses anyway.
Indeed. I suppose the question is "how long is long term"? Obviously, if uber etc decide to compete head on with bus operators in high fare/low car ownership areas such as the eastern half of GM, they would be targetting shorter journeys (eg up to 4 miles) being made for shopping, Primary/Secondary health reasons and low pay, part time jobs where bus fares are the poorest value. Obviously, they would be targetting the bus industry's biggest profit makers so the bus industry would feel it straight away. And once the competition is wiped out (or as good as), the taxi fares would rocket as they too find themselves in a near monopoly market, but then offset by higher costs as car ownership/usage rises even faster and suburban congestion goes to yet another level.
TheGrandWazoo
Veteran Member
So you're talking about pricing strategies. You might want to go into a shop - they too have pricing strategies. No doubt they are making nothing on Swinton to Manchester but you're pinning your hopes on something relatively minimal. Pricing strategies are, in the main, much more to do with ENCTS remuneration, irrespective of whether GM is marginally more generous than Cheshire or anywhere else. It is still a fundamentally flawed scheme that drives a behaviour in bus companies that rewards regular ridership and effectively penalises the occasional traveller because of the "average fare forgone". These are industry wide issues, not particular to Greater Manchester.
The idea that there's some "exploitation of the masses" to fund a parochial bus skirmish (it can hardly be described as a war) and that's why headways have been cut etc.... Were it to be a singular example, you might have a point. However, it's a picture across the country where the pattern of life is changing. To try and compare today with 1998 (let alone 1988) is futile. A refusal to admit to the changing world is exactly why House of Fraser and other retailers are in the clart!!
ENCTS is a seperate argument.
Part of the trouble is the way that the Dereg market has developed over the last 32 years - certainly in GM and I daresay in many other parts of the country.
On 26th October 1986, services were slashed at all times of the day/week except shopping hours.
At the same time, competition appeared on many routes - again at the most profitable times, though not necessarilly on the routes justifying extra capacity. These were largely run by newly formed firms run by exPTE/NBC managers often "with an axe to grind" and motivated by revenge rather than by giving a better service to the customers. Thus fare reductions (and don't forget GMPTE already charged the highest fares of the PTE areas) and genuine timetable increases were extremely rare - as were new innovative services.
This pattern continued well into the mid-noughties when presumably, some independants were hit by the global recession. Nevertheless, some of the worst Operators survived. I won't name them, but I'm sure most enthusiasts and many passengers in the eastern half of GM especially know exactly which three were the worst.
In the meantime, First Manchester had got a deserved reputation for poor reliability, high fares and poor driver attitude - although the latter wasn't of course universal, and could be partly blamed on poor, arrogant management.
Stagecoach were despised in some quarters simply because of the belief that buses should be a public service and not a source of profit for shareholders, the largest of which had no connection with the communities they were profiting from. Nevertheless, operationally Stagecoach were far better than First. Their fares were significantly lower than First (typically 30% ish), services were more reliable, especially in the evenings and away from major corridors and their drivers had a better attitude. Note though, that Driver attitude/reliabiity was largely inherited through continuity of middle management and Inspectorate working with Drivers day to day. I worked at both Stagecoach and First depots before privatisation. I also worked briefly at First in the late 90s and kept in regular contact with people at Stagecoach (mainly Hyde Road) right up to 2013. And I can tell you that even before privatisation, drivers at such as Hyde Road were treated with much more respect than those at GMN/First depots, and this obviously translated on to the road.
Additionally, Stagecoach investment was always reasonable (some years more than reasonable!) and from about 2005 they saw that it was the right time to go head to head with the poorest Operators. Yes, there were operational decisions made on the hoof by Supervisors, but they resourced these "Bus wars" through continued investment and using reserve vehicles from within the fleet. They did NOT slash heavy loading services in high density, low car ownership areas to fight these wars. They probably dropped fares but in the secure knowledge that they would win the "war" and probably in a matter of months not years. Also, because the competition were operating at the edge of the law (eg. drivers that couldn't speak English; buses with loose wheel nuts; passengers thrown off mid route so the driver could do a U-turn in the middle of a busy road; services registered at frequent intervals but simply failing to run at all in the morning peak on schooldays; staff mock wrestling at bus termini scattering 100+ bemused passengers waiting for buses not directly involved in the bus war; blocking same stands etc etc), they probably saw an oppurtunity to enhance their reputation and that of the bus industry as a whole.
Then around 2012, First finally accepted that their fares were too high and reduced most to just above Stagecoach's equivalents (and even below in some instances of single fares). I have also noticed an improvement in driver attitude, but don't use First enough to judge whether reliability has improved.
The next big "twin" development (I'm not sure how close the two are linked) was Stagecoach re-organising their Head Office staff/management (and NOT for the better) and EYMS selling Finglands. Bluebird also sold up a few months earlier, but that was on the cards for years. Stagecoach had competed with Finglands for years on Wilmslow Road and the unique operating environment here meant a completely different fare structure for decades. The Bluebird sale marked an obvious oppurtunity to compete with First and this has largely been achieved with little detriment to passengers elsewhere. The real problem is the 38 route initially from Rusholme to Little Hulton which charges single fares FAR cheaper than anywhere else, but more importantly was resourced through cutting 19 PVRs worth of services on long established, heavy loading corridors mainly (but not solely) in Stockport MBC. This happened in the Winter of 2014/5 but it took nearly three years to address resultant late running due to capacity issues at various times but especially Mon-Fri and Sunday mornings.
Of course, the whole point is - at what point does carlessness for an individual (or family) become UNaffordable? You've pointed out how expensive it is to (legally) acquire a car, but how cheap it is to run it. And with the gap widening, something fundamental has to change. If we have the current level of congestion with barely 75% of households having a car (and many adults within those households who don't drive) imagine what would happen if every adult physically able to drive, did so. And don't forget, a taxi with 1 or two passengers takes up the same roadspace as a private car with 2 or 3 people.
Robertj21a
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Thanks for the history lesson (!) but I'm getting confused as to the real relevance to the original subject. We seem to be going so far off the key issue that I'm no longer sure of what points you are making !
Wouldn't it be better for you to start a new thread that better reflects your issues ?
Wouldn't it be better for you to start a new thread that better reflects your issues ?
No. The relevance to franchising or at least some form of Bus Reform is clear enough. The status quo doesn't work for the majority of the public. Arguably, deregulation never has served the public, but we are now reaching a stage that it is negatively impacting more people than at any time since the late 1980s and the logical, loyal markets are being hit more than ever. This all adds up to increased congestion and (in the short-term at least) pollution and socio-economic exclusion. Even the media are airing the link between poorer bus services and poverty/debt with around 10% of people (can't remember if this was a GM stat or North West as a whole) citing the need to acquire a car as the trigger for getting into spiralling debt and are going without food to make sure their kids were properly fed. This in turn impacts on society more widely. Then there are the implications in other areas like deteriorating access to medical facilities as secondary and tertiary care gets more and more centralised.
The postcode lottery of fares simply adds a moral argument to the practical arguments.
Of course, the question of EQPs, Franchising and any other options remain - noting that no one has explained how EQPs would work and no one has said what alternatives Operators are proposing - but all the arguments that have be made against Reform so far are based on a belief that Market Forces should dictate the operation of all public services. That's simply a political opinion, which I vehemently disagree with. Its also an opinion fatally flawed by the fact that London was never deregulated. You either believe in an economic system or you don't. You can't start twisting your beliefs to suit regional (or local) prejudices.
Robertj21a
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I'm not sure you're really discussing much to do with GM Franchising issues at all. You seem to be basing all your thoughts ad comments on your life experiences in just one part of the UK (Greater Manchester) and making some assumptions that the rest of the country is much the same. It may be that Greater Manchester has a few unique issues, but then I'm sure many other areas could claim the same.
What you seem to be more interested in is simple nationalisation, so that we have numerous services running all over the place, at regular frequencies, and very cheap fares. Isn't that the case ?
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