COMMENT
Two words burst on to the news agenda in December, posing a huge threat to supported bus services: social care.
The government has given local councils in England permission to raise council tax by 3% in 2017/18 and by the same amount again in 2018/19 to raise an additional £652million towards the provision of adult social care by 2020, as well as providing access to a £240million adult social care support fund, all intended to help older and vulnerable people maintain acceptable levels of independence and dignity.
Welcome as this may be, councils say they still face a £2.6billion shortfall by 2020. Do not be surprised, then, if they make further cuts in their remaining bus service budgets in order to address the shortfall.
The Campaign for Better Transport already calculates that £78million was axed from local authority bus funding in England and Wales between 2010 and 2015, resulting in over 2,400 services being reduced, altered or withdrawn.
In England, the amount spent on supported bus services fell from £299.6million to £225.7million and in 2015/16 alone it says 248 services were reduced or altered and 124 were withdrawn completely. The equivalent figures for Wales in the past year are 32 r…
