England to cap single bus fares at £2 from January
I'm intrigued by negativity about bus fares. I don't use bus (rural dwelling wheelchair user) but can clearly see affordable public transport is good for direct beneficiaries but also good for the economy. Me not directly benefiting doesn't make it not good.
Tina19I truly believe that effective, affordable public transport is the only way to manage our future. A car per person is not sustainable. More people should be shouting about ALL public transport being available ans accessible
Linda Allbran15I would love to travel by bus. The nearest station to me is a 2 mile walk. Historically 4 buses p.h. to Birmingham and 4 to Worcester. It was great. Now there is 1 an hour to Birmingham and 2 to Worcester. The reduction in service reduces the appeal because it can be a long wait for the next bus.
Hammerhead Snark12I had a coworker who bitched about the bus system, until he needed it. And then bitched about the bike system. Until he started using it. Want to guess how he votes?
Dogtor Approximate8Things that I preferred about buses - often more accessible both to use and the network placement, that tube / train. ( I can give a specific examples here ) You get to learn an area better as a benefit . Things I regret - I miss conductors . They made it safer for the vulnerable.
deeferro.bsky.social8and at any time through no fault of their own any one may become dependent upon any public service - food, shelter, health service,etc.-it's what we look to our taxes to provide
Derek Mulready 🇮🇪🇪🇺6If. You were an Irish disabled citizen. You would have Free Public transport on all Public services. Provincial Bus. City Bus and Trams Intercity railway services. 🇮🇪🇪🇺
Burnham off to a positive start with his early cost of living announcements. Big difference to Starmer's 'things will get worse before they get better' messaging www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...
MrsVB Shadow Profanity Secretary25Just said exactly this. IMHO Starmer and Reeves big mistake was starting so negatively and the cut to the winter fuel allowance (no matter the right or wrong of it) announced so early was the shit that stuck to them throughout.
Peter Keen23I've no axe to grind with Starmer or Burnham. Either of them will be infinitely better than the fagash fuhrer and >50x better than Badenoch & her corrupt cohort. But Burnham is inheriting the 2nd half of the 5 years which traditionally has been the 'good guy' side of governments' purse string cycle
David15Little things, that in the big scheme cost very little, send out the message that the government is on your side. Performative yes but moral boosting.
lazytitan258.bsky.social14Maybe because Starmer put things in place to repair the economy to allow Burnham to splurge? Interesting difference in how £45/year off energy costs to how the £150 off energy costs was reported! 🤦
Merry Christmas, as in the other place.14Starmer inherited a UK that was broken, and broke by Brexit and by the greed and corruption of the Tories Starmer and Labour in the first 2 years never had the money to throw around. Now Burnham comes in and gets the credit for the UKs economy starting to move in the right direction?!
Microbrain12Comms are 1000x times better than Starmer so far. Simple, tangible promises on topics people care about, all framed as “breathing space”, not a panacea: Day 1: End rough sleeping Day 2: Help with bills Day 3: Bus fare cap Reminds me of Mamdani’s approach. Be interesting if it cuts through.
Robert Lindsay7Great news for those in urban areas. But in Suffolk, two out of five parishes (189 out of c490) have no commuter bus service at all. Suffolk needs more bus services, not just cheaper fares. Tories and their successors Reform, who now control the county, are doing nothing to plan for this.
Andrea Mann3It's also a nice, simple, memorable policy - for both voters and those campaigning! When I was knocking on doors for Sadiq in the 2016 London Mayoral election, a young mum with 2 kids answered at one flat: she wanted to know how Sadiq would help her, and I leapt to one easy pledge I remembered...
It's all very well and good cutting 45 quid pf electricity bills and making (single) bus fares slightly cheaper, but FOOD COSTS 50% MORE THAN IT DID 5 YEARS AGO.
Bela Lugosi's Dad 🏳️⚧️ 🇵🇸25Thats almost fucking double the total inflation in that period. It's *more* than double the median average income growth. We're all getting poorer and food is costing more.
George Bass11Since I wrote this in 2022 my hourly wage is up by 18%. Food is up by 30%: www.ft.com/content/af63...
Binfire Era9A shop with no treats costs as much or more as a shop with several treats once did
leearizuno.bsky.social5It has serious consequences, a workmate of mine's brother got banged up for shoplifting and killed himself in the nick.
elizabeth went to the seaside and ate ice cream and it was nice3When i did my masters I survived and prospered with a ‘£1 a main meal’ limit Now, finishing my studying four years later, £2 a meal is impossible
MattTS2They went from considering changing frozen tax bands to ruling it out in about 2 days
Binfire Era3I get through a lot of Tesco value mouthwash. Like a year ago it was 40p. Now it's 75p, and I expect it will be more next time I get some. Robdogs
MattTS2A quick check of numbers shows the Joseph Roundtree Foundation put the minimal acceptable living standard at £30.5k and the national minimum wage is around £24.8k at full time. That's a huge gap that 45 quid off energy bills and at max around £500 a year from savings in bus journeys barely touches
New UK prime minister Burnham caps nationwide bus fares at £2 in a cost of living effort (excluding London).
Stephen Jacob Smith35Still no all-door boarding though? Would be a good efficiency to help pay for this (not to mention make riding the bus faster and more appealing, reducing the need to own a car, which I hear is a big cost of living!)
Alkinoos5British buses keep missing the point: Currently, op's are being tendered in a highly dysfunctional system that is actively depriving communities of service, priority and acceleration measures are little and bad accesibility plague every system. And their solution is to loot taxpayer money. Again.
New £2 bus fare cap for England in 2027. Reminds me of Haigh’s words from a couple of years ago (when transport secretary): ‘buses are one of the most important engines of social justice available in transport policy.’ This cap will make bus travel more affordable & simpler for a lot of ppl.
Stephen Frost7Also out today: details of the local authority bus grant - this provides LAs with consolidated, longer-term funding. The bus fare cap will provide a welcome boost in passenger numbers, but it is the ability for long term planning & investment that will see lasting improvements made to bus networks.
Liz Crosbie #AllianceNowUK #FBPE4Pity they took the money from Net Zero.
Nick Stone1Welcome news. Has implications for the value of daily and longer term passes.
Londoners are spoilt with £1.75 bus fares already, seems crazy that people would pay much more elsewhere, and also that in London people will complain about 50p/hr charges to park a car.
Not a fan of MANY of Burnham's choices so far, but £2 bus fare cap is Very Good Actually (Before anyone starts, we have a car & one monthly bus pass, but there's 4 of us, we all still use the bus a lot, this will save us money, plus I like it will save others money too bc I am not The Protagonist)
Mog The Confessor7I am disabled in a small remote town and so heavily dependent on my car. I've become a massive fan of park and ride services if I've an event to get to in a city. If everyone's nudged to use them, our cities have so much less traffic.
Neil Turner3Being unable to drive for the next 11 months for medical reasons means I'm using buses more, so yes, this is very welcome for me specifically. As is the cut on VAT on electricity bills as we have an electric car.
We're cutting bus fares by a third for millions of passengers, making your everyday journeys a little bit easier. 🚌 www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...
Nicky6This is very city centric. Having a bus turn up on time or at all is the reality for millions of people who don’t live in cities.
Shame about swathes of the country where buses are as rare as hens’ teeth🤷🏻♀️
Hedgehog Cycling3If one of Andy Burnham's first moves is to authorise more oil and gas extraction, he will lose the goodwill of a lot of people from the off. With parched grass, wildfires and unbearably hot houses, it is *madness* to exacerbate the problem by burning more fossil fuels.
Real Gaz on a proper bike: gazza_d@toot.bike12Good news. Now lets improve the buses out so they are available when and where people need them. We also need many more prioritised bus lanes too so buses don't get stuck in queues of single occupancy cars.
Martin Price9Look mum, a bus stop sign I designed the template for, is being used as as a cover by The Guardian and being posted by the Transport Secretary.
Uk government caps bus prices at £2 in England www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cd...
Most fares, but not longer distance ones. Following the lead of Scotland where Scot Govt has free bus travel for under 22 and over 60's on any distance; and £2 cap for any length of single bus journey in the large chunks of Scotland and extending to all areas in near future.
ajaxgbr.bsky.social1Oh, wait, I wonder where he got that idea from….? 🏴🏴🏴
Lowering the cap on bus fares is such an uncomplicatedly positive move. I wonder how they'll fund it though... Oh... www.businessgreen.com/news/4533241...
Swaledale Mutton Co.2So rather than ask the bus companies to reduce their significant profits, we cause environmental damage? Sigh.
Jonathan Potts1... "so there's no burden to the British taxpayer", who would not conceivably use a bus themselves. This idea of "the taxpayer" as some creature detached from society but constantly being forced to shell out for others (the sort of people who pay to travel on buses?) has got beyond ridiculous.