Government pledges more local control for England bus services

There are only a few areas in England where the local bus company is owned by the council.

The model – known as bus franchising – sees local authorities grant private companies the right to operate in a specific area, although the council maintains control over things like routes, timetables and fares.

Supporters say it means profits can be reinvested into services. For example, if the council puts money into things like bus lanes it sees a direct return – better services, more passengers and higher revenue from fares which can then be reinvested.

In the run-up to the general election, Labour pledged, external that it would hand all local transport authorities the power to run their own bus services and lift restrictions on new, publicly-owned bus operators.

But Shadow Transport Secretary Helen Whately suggested in a statement that “Labour’s plans are unfunded” and the government needed to explain whether local authorities would be expected to raise tax or cut services to fund the proposal.

“Moreover, it won’t make a blind bit of difference for passengers.”

“It won’t increase the number of services and they would much prefer to have the £2 fare cap extended at the Budget,” she added, referring to a policy introduced by the Conservative government, external to cap single bus fares on participating bus routes at £2, which has been extended until December.

Buses are the most commonly used form of public transport, external in Great Britain.

But services have been in long-term decline, with the pandemic hitting passenger numbers and profits hard.

According to the Department for Transport, external, the number of local bus passenger journeys in England rose by 19.4% to 3.4 billion in the year ending March 2023.

This is much lower than usage levels before the pandemic, when journeys totalled 4.1 billion in the 12 months ending March 2020.

Until the 1980s, most bus services were delivered through publicly owned companies, often run by councils, but in 1986 services outside London were deregulated and privatised, leading to the mass sale of council bus companies.

In London a franchising system was introduced, with Transport for London deciding routes, timetables and fares and operators bidding to run services for a fixed fee.

This has contributed to the capital seeing an increase in bus use, with services less hit by cuts, in contrast to other parts of the country.