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Public Transport

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Many local authorities were not entirely ready for the scheme when it was introduced, but that was not necessarily their fault. It is a question of how the scheme was rolled out, the availability of smartcard technology and other matters, which I shall come to. However, we have not yet seen the full picture, which is perhaps another reason for a full evaluation. It is quite clear from the responses that I have received—I imagine that this is true of the responses that the hon. Member for Scarborough and Whitby has received, too, as I suspect that local authorities are saying the same thing to him as they are to me—that there is an overall deficit in the amount of money that councils require to run the scheme on a cost-neutral basis. Part of the reason for that deficit is that the Government have been successful in their concessionary fares scheme. They have encouraged more people to use public transport and, by getting people on to buses, met some of their objectives on social exclusion and even, one might argue, on climate change. The Government can say, ““Here is a success,”” but they cannot say that there is no extra cost to councils as a consequence. I estimate that cost to be around £60 million per annum overall, even allowing for the redistribution of funds between those who have gained and those who have lost. I have talked to our shadow Chancellor, my hon. Friend the Member for Twickenham (Dr. Cable), who is a hard man to get money out of. He has agreed, in our overall tax-neutral arrangements, that £60 million extra will be allocated for concessionary fares in our Budget proposals. I invite the Conservatives to follow suit. We have as much opportunity to speak from the Opposition Benches as the hon. Member for Scarborough and Whitby has. It is not sufficient in opposition merely to draw attention to the Government's deficiencies; it is necessary to put forward constructive alternatives, too. Although the Conservatives are getting quite good at pulling apart the Government's proposals, they are not very good at putting forward any alternatives.