The Voice of Spalding and South Holland
A letter sent to our MP John Hayes:
Dear Mr Hayes, I am one of your constituents and I am writing this email to protest in the strongest terms with respect to the possible inclusion of Clause 21 in the Bus Services Bill.
As our Minister for Transport, you will be aware that this clause will prevent councils from creating new, publicly owned bus companies.
I would also like to express my dismay that there has been little or no discussion in the public domain about Clause 21, thereby preventing communities affected by this decision to contribute their views and allow democratic dialogue to take place.
I live in the South Holland district, and as I have mentioned to you before, I am unable to use public transport to commute to work due to its limited service.
I would welcome any initiatives to set up additional, affordable public transport to meet needs.
Along with the majority of the British public, I believe that our interests are best served if local authorities are devolved the power to organise our local public transport.
Other regions of the UK, such as our neighbour, Nottingham, still run efficient, publicly owned bus companies.
In fact, Nottingham City Transport have won numerous awards demonstrating to me that councils are best placed to organise and run effective, affordable, publicly owned bus services.
In my opinion, other councils and their communities, would benefit strongly from adopting Nottingham’s example and should be free to do so.
In their publication, “Building a World-Class Bus system for Britain”, Transport for Quality of Life estimate that £506 billion could be saved by running buses, outside London, under public ownership.
In addition, TfQL remind us that other European countries regard public ownership of bus services as standard due to its cost effectiveness.
I do recognise that perhaps some regions may benefit from a local franchise due to extremely poor or non-existent bus services; however, I believe that all councils should have the power to establish publicly owned bus services if they wish to do so.
The financial benefits and effectiveness of publicly owned transport systems are undeniable and for that reason, I urge you to remove clause 21 from the bus services bill.
Georgina Harrison
Horseshoe Road
Spalding
