Asked by
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of
the adequacy of the funding available for Bus Improvement
Plans.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for
Transport () (Con)
My Lords, our national bus strategy asks that all English local
transport authorities outside London publish bus service
improvement plans—BSIPs—setting out local visions for the step
change in bus service that is needed, driven by what passengers
and would-be passengers want. At the Budget, we announced £1.2
billion of new dedicated funding for BSIPs, part of over £3
billion of new spend on buses over this Parliament.
(LD)
My Lords, of course, the amount of money already announced is
welcome, but there is a yawning gap before we get to the £3
billion the Government announced. Applications for funding from
local authorities have so far, I believe, totalled £7 billion. Is
that more or less the correct figure? If it is, can she tell us
exactly how the money was allocated for the first tranche of
funding and what criteria it was based on, and reassure us that
the process was fully objective? Can she also tell us when the
money will be announced for the rest of the promised funding? As
it is International Women’s Day, I bring the House’s attention to
the fact that women are overly and disproportionately dependent
on bus travel. It is very important that the Government support
public transport at this time.
(Con)
I am trying to piece that all together. I think that what the
noble Baroness refers to as the first wave is perhaps the places
we mentioned in the levelling up White Paper. Those were just
indications of the places we believed had strong enough BSIPs to
merit investment allocation; further places for investment are
still under consideration. We have been working very hard on
reviewing and understanding the plans we have received. I have to
be honest: some are absolutely excellent, and others need a bit
of work. We are now approaching the stage where the Minister will
make the spending decision, and we anticipate that the places
announced in the levelling up White Paper will be included, as
will many other places.
(Non-Afl)
My Lords, this Question is fundamental to the levelling up
agenda. In certain areas of the north-east, for example, buses
are so infrequent that they fail to meet the needs of the public
and are therefore not used. This compares poorly with, say,
London, where public buses are very frequent and obviously very
well used. Does the Minister therefore agree with me that the
provision of a more frequent bus service will increase usage by
meeting the needs of the public and thereby increase revenue and
mitigate the costs?
(Con)
How could I disagree with that? That is absolutely right, but
there are lots of factors in terms of increasing frequency, and
part of that involves local authorities putting in bus priority
measures so that buses can make it through congested areas. The
noble Lord mentioned the levelling up White Paper and the
importance of buses in that regard. I have to agree. We did say
that by 2030, local public transport connectivity across the
country will be significantly closer to the standards of London.
We mean that, and this is a good step along the way.
(Con)
My Lords, will my noble friend update the House on the position
of concessionary fares for buses, and will she join with me in
saying how important they are to rural life, enabling people to
go about their everyday activities such as shopping, visiting
hospitals and attending doctors’ appointments?
(Con)
I absolutely agree with my noble friend, and there is an awful
lot that we will work together on with the local authorities,
versus what they have in their BSIPs, to encourage those who do
have concessionary passes to come back to bus, because we miss
them terribly. Regarding concessionary payments, we published
concessionary travel recovery guidance—late last year, I think,
but definitely pre-omicron—that looked at how we are going to get
concessionary fares matched up to passholders. At the moment,
there is a discrepancy because we are paying concessionary
amounts out in full. We are looking at that again to make sure it
takes omicron into account, but I agree with my noble friend that
concessionary passholders are welcome back to bus any day.
(Lab)
Last week I asked for confirmation that
“none of the emergency support or recovery grants for buses has
been taken out of the £3 billion for buses and bus services by
2025 announced under the Bus Back Better strategy, and that all
the emergency support and recovery grants are in addition to that
£3 billion”.
The reply was:
“The Government have committed to spend £3 billion over the
course of this Parliament, so I suggest to the noble Lord that,
when we get to the end of this Parliament, we do a totting
up.”—[Official Report, 1/3/22; col. 681.]
For the benefit of the less academically gifted, like me, did
that answer mean that all the emergency support and recovery
grants are or are not in addition to the £3 billion under the Bus
Back Better strategy—or is that a question to which the Secretary
of State also has no idea of the answer?
(Con)
My Lords, we committed to £3 billion of new spend over the course
of this Parliament, and that is what we will deliver. In
addition, the noble Lord will recall that my noble friend Lord
McLoughlin asked a question about other parts of funding within
the system. There will be a letter in the Library, which I will
also share with noble Lords who have spoken in today’s debate,
setting out exactly all the different funding streams available
for buses. They are significant. Some are very long standing,
some came from Covid and others will be part of the funding from
BSIPs and CRSTSs, et cetera.
(Lab)
My Lords, noble Lords have asked about how the Government are to
allocate resources to the different regions. Given that this
seems to be done in some mysterious way that bears no resemblance
to need or the levelling-up agenda, can the Minister say exactly
how allocations will be made under this funding?
(Con)
Yes, I can. There will be probably three different tranches of
funding. Some areas—those that produced the best BSIPs, matching
all the stated outcomes set out in the national bus strategy—will
get transformation funding. A second tranche of local authorities
will go into the improvement category, whereby they are on their
way to preparing the sort of BSIPs that take into account all the
outcomes from the NBS. Other areas will probably need more
support, in terms of capability and capacity, so that they can
fully understand how buses can meet the needs of their
communities. We understand that no place must be left behind. We
hope to provide support to areas where the BSIPs are not fully
developed but where there is huge potential to do so.
(Lab)
My Lords, can we have a straight answer to this question? How
much have local transport authorities asked for under the
Government’s bus service improvement plans? Is the noble
Baroness, Lady Randerson, right that only £1.2 billion is
available for these plans? Are we once again to put up with the
Prime Minister’s sloganising? “Bus Back Better” bears no
resemblance to reality if the figures the noble Baroness gave are
accurate.
(Con)
My Lords, we asked the local transport authorities to be
ambitious and, goodness gracious, they were. That is absolutely
right. Indeed, I am not sure I have ever done a competition in
the Department for Transport that has not been significantly
oversubscribed. In aligning the amount of money we have, we have
to really look at how that money will be used and whether it
meets the requirements in the national bus strategy. I will
mention no names at all but, for example, one local authority bid
to build a new road from the bus funding. That does not
necessarily strike me as exactly what we need out of the bus
funding. My officials are making sure that the areas we fund with
taxpayers’ funding get the best bang for our buck.
(Lab Co-op)
Is not all this bidding for money a bit demeaning for local
authorities? Would it not be much better to give them powers over
all transport in their areas to get on with the job, and give
them the money to do it?
(Con)
To a certain extent, that is the direction of travel we are
moving in— particularly for the large urban areas. For example,
Manchester, Liverpool and West Yorkshire—the combined
authorities—receive pots of funding that they can use in a very
integrated way to establish their integrated transport networks.
CRSTSs, which are part of the money we are giving to places such
as Manchester, match up with funding from BSIPs, so there is a
lot of interrelationship between the different pots of funding. I
take the noble Lord’s point, but we have to balance that with
making sure we get really good value for money for the taxpayer.
