Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what funding has been allocated to support rural bus routes in Cornwall in (a) 2013-14 and (b) 2014-15.

It is for individual local authorities to determine how much of the block grant funding they receive is allocated to supporting bus services. Local authorities in England outside London spend over £340m in direct subsidy to bus services in this way. The latest out-turn figures, for 2012/13, show that Cornwall County Council has an annual budget of £5.2m for this purpose.

The Department also provides direct support to bus services each year through Bus Service Operators Grant (BSOG). Details of BSOG funding paid to bus operators in the last three financial years is available online. It is not possible to provide this data broken down by region. The data are available at:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/bus-service-operators-grant-payments-to-english-operators-up-to-31-march-2013. Following changes to BSOG announced in 2013, the BSOG previously paid to operators in respect of local authority supported bus services has now been devolved to authorities. Cornwall County Council recently received£191,280 covering the period 1 January to 31 March 2014 and a further £765,118 covering the 2014/15 financial year.