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Is Pensioner free travel forcing up prices?

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radamfi

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yet again you fail to read my post properly...(I'm beginning to think you do so deliberately)

the point is if you wish to run a local bus service you HAVE to accept concessionary passes and you HAVE to accept what you are given for providing free travel... whether you like it or not...

to use your earlier analogy with housing benefit... if you decide to become a private landlord you do not HAVE to accept tenants subsidised through the Housing Benefit system... even then IF you CHOOSE to accept housing benefit tenants you do not HAVE to accept anything lower than the going rate for your property...

Current legislation allows landlords to choose their tenants and can refuse housing benefit tenants. Nevertheless, landlords do have to obey other laws regarding tenancy some of which may have changed while they have been landlords. The law could change to compel landlords to accept housing benefit claimants in the future or there could potentially be some far reaching laws in the future regarding rent controls, who knows. Home owners may well decide that they no longer want to rent out their properties as a result.

The point is, you can't assume laws will always stay the same and your business may well become less profitable due to a change in the law.
 
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Teflon Lettuce

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Current legislation allows landlords to choose their tenants and can refuse housing benefit tenants. Nevertheless, landlords do have to obey other laws regarding tenancy some of which may have changed while they have been landlords. The law could change to compel landlords to accept housing benefit claimants in the future or there could potentially be some far reaching laws in the future regarding rent controls, who knows. Home owners may well decide that they no longer want to rent out their properties as a result.

The point is, you can't assume laws will always stay the same and your business may well become less profitable due to a change in the law.

NO the point is you keep making analogies with other forms of business concerning the point of remuneration which do not hold any water... NAME ONE FORM OF BUSINESS WHERE YOU ARE FORCED TO PROVIDE A SERVICE AND YOU GET NO SAY IN WHAT YOU WILL BE PAID FOR PROVIDING THAT SERVICE!
 

pemma

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NO the point is you keep making analogies with other forms of business concerning the point of remuneration which do not hold any water... NAME ONE FORM OF BUSINESS WHERE YOU ARE FORCED TO PROVIDE A SERVICE AND YOU GET NO SAY IN WHAT YOU WILL BE PAID FOR PROVIDING THAT SERVICE!

When is an operator forced to run a service? If it's a commercial service the operator can revise or cancel it if they give 56 days notice. If it's a contracted service the operator choose to bid for the contract.
 

Teflon Lettuce

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When is an operator forced to run a service? If it's a commercial service the operator can revise or cancel it if they give 56 days notice. If it's a contracted service the operator choose to bid for the contract.

The point I am making is that operating a local bus service is the ONLY business where, to do so, you are legally obliged to provide something (in this case concessionary travel) and yet you have no say whatsoever in what recompense you will receive for doing so.. and tbh I'm pretty sure that if a situation were to be written into a contract between 2 private individuals said contract would be deemed at law to be illegal due to unfair terms and conditions.

there is NOTHING anyone can say that will ever show the concessionary fare schemes in this country to be fair and equitable to operators!
 

radamfi

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NO the point is you keep making analogies with other forms of business concerning the point of remuneration which do not hold any water... NAME ONE FORM OF BUSINESS WHERE YOU ARE FORCED TO PROVIDE A SERVICE AND YOU GET NO SAY IN WHAT YOU WILL BE PAID FOR PROVIDING THAT SERVICE!

You are the one insisting that comparisons should be made with other kinds of business. But if you insist, how about water companies? The prices they charge are regulated by Ofwat and they are also compelled to invest vast sums of money on investment, meaning that water companies don't make as much money as shareholders expected.

Just in case you don't accept that response, I will continue by saying that the government is acting legally by forcing bus companies to accept a particular reimbursement rate so it is irrelevant whether or not such "unfairness" is unique to the bus industry or not. The big bus companies are still operating profitably and haven't decided to shut up shop because the reimbursement rates are unacceptable.
 

Teflon Lettuce

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You are the one insisting that comparisons should be made with other kinds of business. But if you insist, how about water companies? The prices they charge are regulated by Ofwat
if said water companies can make a valid case for charging more they are allowed to do so.... else why are water rates different from company to company?

... I will continue by saying that the government is acting legally by forcing bus companies to accept a particular reimbursement rate so it is irrelevant whether or not such "unfairness" is unique to the bus industry or not.
Explain why you think it is irrelevant... just because something is legal does not make it fair or equitable!

The big bus companies are still operating profitably and haven't decided to shut up shop because the reimbursement rates are unacceptable.
Stagecoach in South Wales forced a WA rethink a couple of years back by threatening to withdraw services wholesale... and I'm sure most of the large groups.. to some extent or other... cross subsidise any losses from concessionary payments...

but the real big issue with concessionary re-imbersement is on longer inter urban and rural routes where journeys are longer, but the rate paid isn't much higher than on town routes....

as to companies closing down because of the re-imbursement rate... IIRC when Pennine Motors shut down the sole reason given for them shutting up shop was the poor rate that N Yorks were paying for the passes (IIRC a rate of 23p per pass)... I'm sure also that the problem with re-imbursement rates has been a strong contributing factor in a number of other notable closures...

At the end of the day though, the stupid thing is that not funding the concessionary scheme doesn't really cut the cost to the councils... as most of the problems occur on rural and inter urban routes it means when a commercial route is given up due to being unprofitable the council then needs to tender it out as a socially neccessary journey... usually costing them more than paying for the passes properly in the first place!
 

graham11

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Since I got my bus pass I have religiously kept a written record of every free bus ride I have taken.

Most were in the Shropshire area but a few were in other areas and a couple of free rides on the Blackpool tram ( when they allowed the bus pass owners to go free.)

In that time I have had 1065 free rides.
Now even at the low price of 60p per ride it means that the bus companies have had £640 in subsidy.
The point is if I hadn`t had the pass I would probably never ridden on the bus ---- I would have only used my motorcar,
Many of the rides were just for a ride out and a bit of sightseeing.
Not one of the buses I rode on were anything like full so I didn`t deprive any full paying passenger of a ride.
Surely I must have been a benefit to the bus companies of at least £640.......

Graham
 

radamfi

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Explain why you think it is irrelevant... just because something is legal does not make it fair or equitable!

It is irrelevant because whether it is fair or not makes no difference to whether it will happen. If you want change then use your vote accordingly. If you want me to have sympathy with bus operators then you are out of luck. If they were offering good value adult fares, delivering good passenger numbers and getting vast numbers of people out of cars, then maybe I would be supporting you right now.
 

Teflon Lettuce

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It is irrelevant because whether it is fair or not makes no difference to whether it will happen. If you want change then use your vote accordingly. If you want me to have sympathy with bus operators then you are out of luck. If they were offering good value adult fares, delivering good passenger numbers and getting vast numbers of people out of cars, then maybe I would be supporting you right now.

Tarring all with the same brush doesn't help your argument... Stagecoach are reknowned for their good value fares... as to not getting people out of cars... I assume you've never been to London, Oxford, Cambridge, Brighton, Manchester etc etc where bus companies have all succeeded in doing exactly what you claim they don't do...

and it's not just the big boys that do a good job... here in wales an example of good value was the 701 where a day return from Aberystwyth-Cardiff was £20 until the service was withdrawn... That's a round trip of 250 miles... that works out at 8 pence per mile... somehow I don't think you could do the same journey by car for that amount... especially when you take into account the cost of parking!

Another example 585 Aberystwyth-Tregaron-Lampeter (route mileage 33.5 miles £3.50 single (10.4/mile) or £5.80 return (8.7p/mile)
 

ivanhoe

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there is NOTHING anyone can say that will ever show the concessionary fare schemes in this country to be fair and equitable to operators!

I'm SURE there is. The idea that ENCTS is a drain on operators could also be disputed. What I'm not sure about is where people have got their 60p reimbursement from. As far as I'm aware, this is commercial in confidence but if anybody can point me to a link which states this, it would be useful.

ENCTS provides income for spare capacity on the buses which exists after the morning rush. Large operators such as Arriva and Trent Barton even have web pages encouraging you to use the passes. I can see small operators having potential cash flow issues, but they would have factored this into their business plans. Whilst I would agree that a full bus load of ENCTS passengers will barely cover marginal costs if the reimbursement rate is about 60p, it is highly unlikely that this scenario happens on a regular basis. I can only speak for the area in which I use buses , i.e. Loughborough,. On most occasions, the Arriva 126/127 has a spread of fare paying passengers as do the local Kinch Buses(Trent Barton). If there were no ENCTS do you think Bus fares would be less? Perhaps that is what we should discuss.
 

radamfi

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Tarring all with the same brush doesn't help your argument... Stagecoach are reknowned for their good value fares... as to not getting people out of cars... I assume you've never been to London, Oxford, Cambridge, Brighton, Manchester etc etc where bus companies have all succeeded in doing exactly what you claim they don't do...

What is the nationwide modal share for buses, outside London?

Supporters of the bus industry always trot out the few well known towns where buses are relatively successful, in large part due to the alternatives being impractical, and ignore the fact that the vast majority of people live outside those areas.
 

Teflon Lettuce

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I'm SURE there is.
My argument about fairness and equitability refers to the way that the law means you HAVE to accept the passes... and you get no say in what you will be paid for providing this legally required service... are you aware that, quite legally, a council could say to an operator "we will be cutting the payment to 5p per pass journey" and there is NOTHING the operator can do about it if they want to continue running the service.. the council in fact is judge jury and executioner in any payment decision!
 

Teflon Lettuce

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What is the nationwide modal share for buses, outside London?

Supporters of the bus industry always trot out the few well known towns where buses are relatively successful, in large part due to the alternatives being impractical, and ignore the fact that the vast majority of people live outside those areas.
again you selectively respond... I gave you 2 examples of fares outside of the "few well known towns".... and to be honest... I do not see any relevance between modal share and whether a concessionary scheme is fair and equitable or not... TWO TOTALLY SEPARATE ISSUES...

Oh and most of Stagecoaches operating area is outside of the "few well known towns"
 
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radamfi

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again you selectively respond... I gave you 2 examples of fares outside of the "few well known towns".... and to be honest... I do not see any relevance between modal share and whether a concessionary scheme is fair and equitable or not... TWO TOTALLY SEPARATE ISSUES...

The only reason why I would care if the scheme is fair is would be if I felt that the "wounded party" deserves my sympathy. After all, you are talking about "fairness" rather than "legality" and fairness is subjective. If I felt bus companies were currently doing a good job and the excellent bus service was at risk if the reimbursement rate was not improved then I would have a different view. But bus patronage is at an embarrassingly low level.
 

trainmania100

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Something must be causing them to go up
I couldn't believe my sister was asked for £7.80 for a return on stagecoach Brighton to Worthing...
 

radamfi

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Something must be causing them to go up
I couldn't believe my sister was asked for £7.80 for a return on stagecoach Brighton to Worthing...

That can't be right. We were told a few posts ago how good value Stagecoach is.
 

ivanhoe

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My argument about fairness and equitability refers to the way that the law means you HAVE to accept the passes... and you get no say in what you will be paid for providing this legally required service... are you aware that, quite legally, a council could say to an operator "we will be cutting the payment to 5p per pass journey" and there is NOTHING the operator can do about it if they want to continue running the service.. the council in fact is judge jury and executioner in any payment decision!

Then operators would make decisions on the frequency or even viability of the routes and act accordingly. It is a card that most councils would not play because they would be stopped by Government. Your 15p is hypothetical and would never happen. Apart from Stagecoach's Finance Director, which of the big players have ever made any threats or whinges in public?
 

Teflon Lettuce

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The only reason why I would care if the scheme is fair is would be if I felt that the "wounded party" deserves my sympathy. After all, you are talking about "fairness" rather than "legality" and fairness is subjective. If I felt bus companies were currently doing a good job and the excellent bus service was at risk if the reimbursement rate was not improved then I would have a different view. But bus patronage is at an embarrassingly low level.

You are wrong... fairness isn't subjective at law... in fact it is quite clearly defined in contract law...

as to your contention that you don't think bus companies are currently doing a good job... why not try starting your own company using YOUR views as a business model and show them how to do it?

as to bus patronage being at an embarresingly low level... I would like to know what you are basing that assumption on? certainly there are places where companies could do better.... but many of the places I travel bus use is fairly healthy...and I don't just stick to the oft quoted areas...

and more to the point if bus use is at a low level why is that? after all no commercial business will go out of it's way to ruin it's customer base... so why are you so adamant that it is a failure of the companies?
 

Teflon Lettuce

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Something must be causing them to go up
I couldn't believe my sister was asked for £7.80 for a return on stagecoach Brighton to Worthing...
I must admit that does seem high for a stagecoach fare (though actually works out about 30p/ mile)

Of course, being an area of high employment rates, higher than average household income, etc I should imagine that wage rates are rather higher than average for a bus company.... of course being a seaside area I bet your life other costs such as business rates will be markedly higher... I should also imagine that day tickets are cheaper option... also period tickets...(out of interest how much is an explorer ticket in that area?)
 

Teflon Lettuce

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Then operators would make decisions on the frequency or even viability of the routes and act accordingly. It is a card that most councils would not play because they would be stopped by Government. Your 15p is hypothetical and would never happen. Apart from Stagecoach's Finance Director, which of the big players have ever made any threats or whinges in public?

whilst I agree that scenario would probably never happen I can give you an example local to me...

701 Aberystwyth-Cardiff 125 miles each way

Lewis Coaches were operating this service and were receiving £6.50 per pass

when they went bust due to problems in another part of the business another operator looked at taking over the service... they were offered £4 per pass for the 1st 6 months.... reducing to £3.25 per pass thereafter....

needless to say the service no longer exists as at that rate there is no way an operator could break even at that rate of reimbursement
 

the101

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Since I got my bus pass I have religiously kept a written record of every free bus ride I have taken.

Most were in the Shropshire area but a few were in other areas and a couple of free rides on the Blackpool tram ( when they allowed the bus pass owners to go free.)

In that time I have had 1065 free rides.
Now even at the low price of 60p per ride it means that the bus companies have had £640 in subsidy.
The point is if I hadn't had the pass I would probably never ridden on the bus ---- I would have only used my motorcar,
Many of the rides were just for a ride out and a bit of sightseeing.
Not one of the buses I rode on were anything like full so I didn't deprive any full paying passenger of a ride.
Surely I must have been a benefit to the bus companies of at least £640.......

Graham
Bus operators have not received a penny of 'subsidy' as a result of your bus pass usage.

They will have been paid from the public purse for a service provided to you on a commercial basis, however.
 

radamfi

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You are wrong... fairness isn't subjective at law... in fact it is quite clearly defined in contract law...

as to your contention that you don't think bus companies are currently doing a good job... why not try starting your own company using YOUR views as a business model and show them how to do it?

as to bus patronage being at an embarresingly low level... I would like to know what you are basing that assumption on? certainly there are places where companies could do better.... but many of the places I travel bus use is fairly healthy...and I don't just stick to the oft quoted areas...

and more to the point if bus use is at a low level why is that? after all no commercial business will go out of it's way to ruin it's customer base... so why are you so adamant that it is a failure of the companies?

Transport Statistics Great Britain shows buses in England to have a 5% share of distance travelled and 7% by trips. Don't forget that includes London, which accounts for around half of all trips, so outside London the picture is even bleaker.

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploa...ta/file/576095/tsgb-2016-report-summaries.pdf

The book "Transport for Suburbia"

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Transport-Suburbia-Beyond-Automobile-Age/dp/1844077403

compares patronage levels in a number of industrialised countries and British towns compare very poorly to comparable towns/cities in mainland Europe. It's a few years old now but I doubt British towns would look any better on current data.

It is ultimately a failure of government as they have failed to put in place the framework and funding that leads to good results.
 

Teflon Lettuce

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They are the best value *compared to other major operators*. That just shows that the rest are even worse value.

well by what measure would YOU measure whether they are good value or not? long haul flights? the price of a kebab? seriously when you make a judgement on the value of a new pc what measure do you use? YOUR OLD PC... you don't measure it by what good value your new fridge is do you?

selective reading of facts so that the "facts" fit your opinion... rather than forming an opinion based on the facts and observations... tbh it's a bit like trying to have a rational debate with an ISIS fanatic.... has anyone got a brick wall I can borrow to bang my head against?
 

Tetchytyke

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Bus operators have not received a penny of 'subsidy' as a result of your bus pass usage.

They will have been paid from the public purse for a service provided to you on a commercial basis, however.

And this is the problem with arguing about ENCTS. People see the bus companies getting billions for "free" travel but don't understand that this is money they'd get anyway from the fare payer. The question boils down to who pays.

Whilst the taxpayer does cover most of the cost of ENCTS, operators are of the opinion the reimbursement rate doesn't cover the true cost. Of course operators would say this regardless of rates, but there's truth in it. And that shortfall can only come from an operator's other revenue streams: commercial fare payers and tendered services income.

ENCTS distorts everything because of this. ENCTS makes tendered costs higher yet allows councils a smaller budget for tendering. This reduces tendered mileage, affecting vulnerable services. Services that run must survive commercially, and so fares charged get higher to support the service. The situation is a mess.

Comparisons with housing benefit don't work because the tenant is liable for the rent regardless of whether the housing benefit is sufficient. The benefit rate is capped regardless of what the actual rent charged is, and if the tenant doesn't pay they get evicted.

The same principle would require ENCTS passholders to "top up" their free pass to the actual fare costs. Maybe this is the way it'll have to go. I'd certainly want to see ENCTS passholders charged a flat fare of 50p. I don't think the current system is sustainable. But nobody has the guts to do it.
 

radamfi

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well by what measure would YOU measure whether they are good value or not?

They are plainly expensive when compared to the perceived marginal cost of motoring, especially when there are no car park charges. British bus fares are also expensive compared to the fares charged in other industrialised countries.
 

Teflon Lettuce

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And this is the problem with arguing about ENCTS. People see the bus companies getting billions for "free" travel but don't understand that this is money they'd get anyway from the fare payer. The question boils down to who pays.

Whilst the taxpayer does cover most of the cost of ENCTS, operators are of the opinion the reimbursement rate doesn't cover the true cost. Of course operators would say this regardless of rates, but there's truth in it. And that shortfall can only come from an operator's other revenue streams: commercial fare payers and tendered services income.

ENCTS distorts everything because of this. ENCTS makes tendered costs higher yet allows councils a smaller budget for tendering. This reduces tendered mileage, affecting vulnerable services. Services that run must survive commercially, and so fares charged get higher to support the service. The situation is a mess.

Comparisons with housing benefit don't work because the tenant is liable for the rent regardless of whether the housing benefit is sufficient. The benefit rate is capped regardless of what the actual rent charged is, and if the tenant doesn't pay they get evicted.

The same principle would require ENCTS passholders to "top up" their free pass to the actual fare costs. Maybe this is the way it'll have to go. I'd certainly want to see ENCTS passholders charged a flat fare of 50p. I don't think the current system is sustainable. But nobody has the guts to do it.

Much of what you have said is very true... Certainly the ENCTS and the Welsh and Scottish equivalents were not introduced for any altruistic reasons... they were introduced purely as a political bribe (55-74 yr olds are the demographic group with the highest voting %)... Nor was the scheme properly costed.. IIRC funding was based on the new scheme having no effect on usage over the disparate schemes it replaced...

anyone with the slightest knowledge of human nature could have foreseen that average usage would go up once it became free... after all if suddenly I was entitled to as much fillet steak as I wanted for free would I still eat scrag end of lamb?

and then what happened when the cost began to spiral? the Treasury abdicated all responsibility for funding the scheme and said it was up to local councils to find the money (without reclassifying it as an essential service so they have no legal duty to find the money to fund it properly)

Although I am a great believer in the welfare state IMHO the ONLY thing that should NOT be means tested is the basic pension...

I've said this before.... we are in the ridiculous situation whereby a pensioner with a million in the bank and a nice big bungalow in the posh part of town is entitled to free travel... whereas a single mother who has been abandoned by her ****less husband to bring up 4 kids on her own is entitled to absolutely NO help with travel costs...
 

TheGrandWazoo

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God forbid Radamfi would keep on topic rather than throwing up chaff of other countries, modal shift etc etc

The fact is that this is the usual ideological stuff that is usually trotted out. I remember Radamfi from about 4 years reckoning that based on Surrey (and extrapolating that nationwide), bus services would be increasingly subsidised (e.g. fewer commercial services) and that it would be a pre-cursor to his utopian Dutch vision of the centralised control of services by a public body. Of course, that has turned out to be rubbish as YoY spending cuts were clearly baked into local government central grant.

Here we have it again.... a unyielding, unwillingness to accept what is actually happening.

Teflon is almost 100% spot on in his analysis. The only thing that I would point out is that inflation is a rather crude measure in some respects in that it encompasses everything whilst an individual industry may have specific challenges. That is certainly the case with the bus industry - increasing fuel prices and the fuel duty escalator were definite factors - http://www.speedlimit.org.uk/petrolprices.html

Getting back onto Utopian visions, the view from Radamfi is that operators will not be able to operate sustainably and can always exit the market. I assume that the view is that the public sector will, of course, be able to step in. The reality is that should ENCTS remuneration be insufficient, the likeliest move will be that services (or individual journeys) will be cut. This isn't a portentious prediction of doom - this is what happens now! We're seeing it across the country.

The main issue that has been experienced is in terms of some skewing of the market. The upside for operators are those instances of being able to fill spare capacity on existing services - perhaps those cross country services where pass holders now fancy a day out where they otherwise wouldn't have bothered.

The real losers have been in three main areas:

1. Local services and especially in smaller market towns. The relatively small numbers of passengers were pensioners anyway and operators were getting fare X. Now they're getting a reduced fare Y but the nature of the service is unlikely to generate any additional passenger journeys.
2. Tourist areas where pensioners at full fare were previously a welcome revenue source during the summer season and so pass remuneration reduces that considerably
3. Instances where considerable additional resource for relatively little additional revenue to offset costs

As we have said before, it's not the fault of pass holders nor the companies. It is the government who introduced a scheme and are insufficiently funding it, and also not funding local bus services. As ENCTS is a statutory instrument but bus service provision is not, the easiest way to reduce ENCTS is to reduce patronage by not providing services in the first place.

Another person who is illustrating this is Peter Shipp, evil overload of those corporate gits EYMS http://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/try-...-fare-better/story-20917723-detail/story.html - and yes, remuneration levels are most assuredly being cut.
 

TheGrandWazoo

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They are plainly expensive when compared to the perceived marginal cost of motoring, especially when there are no car park charges. British bus fares are also expensive compared to the fares charged in other industrialised countries.

Bus fares across the world are often artificially low through subsidy payments. We could fund that but FFS, we are barely able to fund the health service!
 
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