Miles of new bus lanes and more services promised

Hundreds of miles of new bus lanes and price caps on tickets are being planned for England under a new bus strategy from the government.

The £3bn plan will make buses across the country cheaper and easier to use, the Department for Transport said.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said the strategy would create thousands of jobs, as well as making buses greener and more frequent.

But unions and Labour said it would not reverse past cuts to services.

Speaking as he toured the National Express depot in Coventry, the prime minister said the city would become the UK's first electric bus city.

Mr Johnson said the scheme would drive down carbon emissions and pollution.

He added that the number of people using buses was beginning to "bounce back" and that good bus routes could be "transformatory" for people's job prospects.

The government is promising services that are so frequent, passengers will be able to "turn up and go".

As part of the shake-up, daily price caps will be introduced so that people can use the bus as many times a day as they need.

More evening and weekend services will also be introduced, and all buses will accept contactless payment, the government pledged.

It hopes to meet its targets through so-called enhanced partnerships that will see local authorities agree to make improvements to infrastructure in return for better services from bus companies. More franchising will also be introduced.

As part of the plan, the government has promised to deliver 4,000 new electric or hydrogen buses that will be built in the UK by the end of this parliament.

It will also end the sale of diesel buses and has launched a consultation to decide when the ban should come into effect.

Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said: "Buses are this country's favourite way of getting around. But services across England are patchy, and it's frankly not good enough."

Government figures from 2019 show that 7% of people travelled to work by bus, while 68% commute by car.

But bus use has fallen steadily over the past decade, along with financial support from both local and central government.

In 2009, 4.64 billion journeys were taken on local buses. By 2019, that figure was 4.32 billion.

The government said it wanted to encourage more people on to buses as the UK emerges from the coronavirus crisis.

"As we build back from the pandemic, better buses will be one of our first acts of levelling-up," Boris Johnson said.

"Just as they did in London, our reforms will make buses the transport of choice, reducing the number of car journeys and improving quality of life for millions."

But even in the capital, the number of journeys taken by bus has fallen by 1.4% since 2009.

In a statement, Labour's shadow bus minister Sam Tarry said: "This so-called strategy offers nothing for those who were looking for a bold vision to reverse the millions of miles of bus routes lost across the country."

"The Tories said deregulation would improve our buses but they're running bus services into the ground. Passengers now face a toxic mix of rising fares, cuts to services and reduced access."

Sarah Olney, Liberal Democrat spokeswoman for transport, said: "It's welcome that the Conservatives have finally realised that people take buses, however today's announcement will not reverse their endless cuts to our vital bus networks.

"Liberal Democrats believe local authorities must be at the heart of any bus strategy. This includes giving them power to run their own bus services, instead of being shackled to unpopular private bus companies who too often fail the communities they serve."

The Unite union, which represents more than 70,000 bus workers, said the plan would not be enough to reverse a decade of service cuts that have left communities isolated.

"The national bus strategy is an admission that the 1980s deregulation of the bus service has been a complete failure," said Bobby Morton, the union's national officer for passenger transport.

"Fares have increased, services have reduced, private operators cherry-pick the most profitable routes and social exclusion has mushroomed as connectivity has been cut."

But bus operator Stagecoach said it welcomed the "ambition" of the government's new strategy.

"For too long, the power of buses to transform local communities and local people's lives has been overlooked," its chief executive Martin Griffiths said.

He added that it was "critical" the new strategy was matched with "the right level of funding" and consistent government policy on buses.

"We look forward to understanding more detail around the government's plans for the future and its proposed roadmap to bridge from the pandemic to a new era for buses."

Today's strategy makes the right noises that will appeal to bus users.

But some passenger groups say the devil could be in the detail. They want to know how the government is going to make sure it pays for the long list of promises it has made.

That will come down to the plans that local authorities make with bus operators.

Some councils and operators will already be ahead of the game, with teams that are keen to work together, particularly after the past year when many bus routes and services had to change during the pandemic.

Other councils will find it more difficult to get people with the right skills in place to be able to work out what will be best for bus users in their area.

The government says it will provide support and funding to help draw up those plans.

How each part of the country experiences these changes will depend on how those local decisions are made.