Local elections on 4 May will decide who will be the mayors of six combined authorities across England — Cambridgeshire & Peterborough, Greater Manchester, Liverpool City Region, Tees Valley, West Midlands and West of England.
These are the politicians who will have the powers, vested in the new Bus Services Act (BSA), to end 30 years of bus deregulation in their areas and instead franchise whole networks along London lines. Should they choose to do so. Which is a big question. It seemed until a few months ago that things were certain to go this way in Greater Manchester. But as we reported last month, the words have turned equivocal. Transport for Greater Manchester’s vision for 2040 talks simply of franchising — along with the other tools in the new BSA box — maybe being beneficial.
In public — and especially in Parliament — the frontrunner candidate in that particular mayoral election, Labour’s Andy Burnham, speaks ill of deregulation and leaves little clue of supporting anything short of full franchising. But industry people say their private meetings with him have left a different impression. One that he wants action taken quickly to address weaknesses in bus provision, but that the hoops to…
