Fresh pleas for rural bus funding

Oct 15 2007 by Dave Black, The Journal

FRESH pleas were made last night for improved Government funding after new figures showed that spending in Northumberland on protecting public transport services is the second lowest in the country.

A study by transport think-tank the TAS Partnership has revealed that last year Northumberland County Council spent £2.06 per resident on subsidising buses, trains and other forms of public transport – with only Cumbria spending less at £1.28 per head.

The figures show that West Sussex spends £3.83 per head on subsidies and Cornwall £4.40, while councils in more populated counties such as Surrey and Hertfordshire spend more than £10 per head.

Yesterday the TAS Partnership said the quality and spending on public transport in rural areas is a “postcode lottery”. TAS director Chris Cheek said: “The level of under-funding of rural buses is particularly unfair, unjustified and unsustainable. Scores of routes and services have been axed, and we’re seeing death by a thousand cuts.”

Last night the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) and a senior Labour county councillor blamed the low level of public transport subsidy in Northumberland on a lack of funding from the Government.

CPRE regional policy officer Nic Best, who lives in Morpeth, said: “This is an important issue for us because if we want to keep our rural communities viable it is vital to have good public transport. We would like to have shops, post offices and facilities in all our villages but, if we can’t do that, the people who live there must have decent public transport.

“I don’t believe there is much the county council can do about this because they are allocated most of their funding from central Government.

“The fact is, the Government doesn’t seem to see public transport in rural areas as a high priority.”

County council chairman Coun Robert Arckless, who lives in Amble and is a regular bus user, said he was not surprised that the level of spending on public transport subsidy was low.

He said: “Northumberland is one of the worst resourced authorities in the country in terms of Government grant.

“We have difficult choices to make and have decided to prioritise children’s and adult services.

“I don’t think that is wrong but it does make providing other services extremely difficult. We subsidise bus services where we can but, given the financial pressures we are under, it will continue to be an issue.”

A spokesman for the Department of Transport said: “The Government is committed to rural transport. The department has invested £550m in rural bus services since 1998 and this funding now supports more than 33 million passenger journeys each year.”