Three months to fix troubled bus service

The council is under pressure to fix the county’s crumbling bus service before ‘lifeline’ money runs out in a matter of months.

Worcestershire County Council is currently carrying out another review of the bus network after its bid for £86 million in government funding was rejected outright last month.

Government bus recovery grant (BRG) money, which was handed to bus operators to ensure essential services continued during the Covid-19 pandemic, will stop in October which the council fears will bring further cuts to routes.

Cllr Mike Rouse, who replaced Cllr Alan Amos as cabinet member for highways and transport just last week, admitted he “felt the pain” of the public over the state of the county’s buses and was disappointed by the failed funding bid.

The council’s key scrutiny committee grilled the new cabinet member at a meeting at County Hall on Tuesday (May 25).

Cllr Tom Wells, who chairs the council’s key overview and scrutiny performance board, said “radical” change was needed as the previously “viable, sensible, reliable and convenient” service of 15 years ago had vanished.

“We need to do something radical and quickly,” he said. “[Our] bus improvement plan will not be enough on its own.

“It is supply and demand, but we have got to increase demand… We need to explore options that have not been explored previously.

“The bus operators and the marketplace aren’t really helping us right now.”

The council is still waiting to hear back from the Department for Transport over why its bus bid failed and must also submit its review, the results of which it says will be used to create a ‘fit for purpose network, to ministers by July 1.

Councillors were far from complimentary about the county’s buses with Cllr Richard Udall, who represents the city’s St John’s division, telling Cllr Rouse he was inheriting a “poisoned chalice.”

The committee also told the new cabinet member that more needed to be done to encourage people to use buses – with the number of passengers at around 70 per cent compared to pre-Covid levels.

Cllr Laura Gretton, who represents the Harvington division, said the council was in danger of creating a self-fulfilling prophecy if it did not do more to promote bus usage.