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Concessionary Bus Travel Bill [Lords]

When the scheme was introduced in 2006—or, at least when it was announced by the Chancellor in 2005—it was widely welcomed, not least in Tyne and Wear because it returned us to a position that we were in 30 years ago. The Labour Tyne and Wear authority introduced a free travel scheme around the county 30 years ago, which had to be abandoned because of the Conservative party policy of introducing charges. I have to say that I resisted it at the time, because I felt that if charges were introduced, they would inevitably be increased, which is precisely what happened. The return to free fares was widely welcomed—until the sting in the tail was discovered. The funding allocated to the scheme used the standard local authority funding formula, which meant that it was tied to population, not to bus usage. In Tyne and Wear, of course, there is a high take-up of public transport, so we ended up with a shortfall of funding. In 2006-07, £5.4 million of cuts in bus services had to be made—cuts to vulnerable people and to young people, as the teen travel scheme of subsidised travel for students had to be severely cut back. Furthermore, £2 million had to be taken from the reserves, adding up in total to an actual cut of £7.4 million last year for one of the poorest regions in the country. This year, of course, the scheme continues under the same formula and has to be subsidised yet again by Tyne and Wear council tax payers. Further subsidies will have to be found, so by the time we get to the national scheme next year, it will have cost Tyne and Wear £10 million to run the free travel scheme over the two-year period.