Improving local bus services in England outside London

Of a number of issues this report highlights, we consider it most important that the Department should set out: a) a clear, consistent vision of the future of bus travel, that encourages and supports local authorities to make long-term plans for their own local needs. The Department should articulate clearly what success would look like for bus travel in urban and non-urban areas and how it expects new and existing models of delivery to feature. This vision should be consistent with its policy statements on future urban mobility and decarbonisation, and emerging long-term trends in travel;

Ref Page 12, paragraph 22, point a · Implemented 03/2021

b) a detailed, transparent delivery plan with clear objectives, responsibilities and accountabilities for the Department and others. The Department’s forthcoming National Bus Strategy and accompanying delivery plan should incorporate details of what it will do to lead and support change, what others in central government will do and what it expects local authorities and operators to do, alongside how they will be incentivised and made accountable for doing it;

Ref Page 12, paragraph 22, point b · Implemented 05/2021

c) good quality data and measures of success. The Department should look widely at all its sources of performance information to develop a basket of measures granular enough to understand outcomes for users, local authorities and operators, so that it can baseline and monitor the system’s progress, and adjust as necessary. This could build on the closer working with MHCLG, local authorities and operators during the pandemic, and include using the information created through the Bus Open Data programme;

Ref Page 12, paragraph 22, point c · Implemented Q1 2025-26

d) an active role in supporting local authorities to access evidence and experience to support improvement. The Department should work with MHCLG, local government, transport planning professional groups and operators to make it easy for local transport planners to share experience, resources, evidence and advice, and where necessary build local capacity to influence and improve bus services; and

Ref Page 13, paragraph 22, point d · Implemented 06/2023

e) the amount and form of funding, for both local authorities and operators, that is necessary to achieve the objectives of the bus strategy. The Department has already committed to providing a long-term funding model. It should work with MHCLG, HM Treasury and local government as part of wider local government funding discussions, to ensure that the various elements of bus funding available combine effectively to support the objectives set out in the strategy. This should include: reform of the Bus Service Operators Grant to ensure incentives are aligned with government’s objectives; and work to understand the actual costs to local authorities of funding statutory concessions and the effect on budgets for bus improvement. The overall revenue funding model should also be transparent enough to contribute to enhanced accountability for improving buses.

Ref Page 13, paragraph 22, point e · Implemented Q1 2025-26