Bus Improvement Plans

Lord Rosser Excerpts

Tuesday 8th March 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (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.

[Lord Rosser (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?

[Baroness Vere of Norbiton (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.