South Pennine Community Transport Co-director Kevin Carr discusses the state of the industry and the way forwards
I have been around buses, in one fashion or another, for most of my life and I can confidently say that the industry is in an unprecedented era of trouble with challenges on most fronts. Extraordinarily high fuel costs, driver shortages, funding shortfalls, vehicle shortages, industrial action and high political pressure all combine in a nasty cauldron which threatens the future of buses. And the bad news is that we have not seen the worst of it just yet – the remainder of this year will offer up some eye watering and shocking moments that most of us would not even have had nightmares about.
I paint a dark picture but sadly this is the reality. Whatever we thought about the effects of lockdowns, these were nothing compared to what lays in front of us from an industry point of view. The bus industry is battening down the hatches as we speak ready for an almighty storm ahead.
Rather than looking with fear into the eye of the storm, it is important that now the industry looks ahead and plans for a new future. In the event of any crisis it is vital to look immediately at how to rebuild and what opportunities will lay ahead.
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This may well be a time for buses to reset and move ahead in a new way. One of the few good things that we have witnessed and learned of late is a greater spirit of co-operation. I have seen entities helping each other out and new understandings and relationships formed where they would never have been formed before – shouting out to us that the word ‘partnership’ should be our guiding light.
It seems to be trendy to kick buses right now. Mayors and politicians are all obsessing about ‘taking back control’ of buses and bringing buses into public ownership. Frankly, this is folly and diverts attention away from the genuine issues. Whether a local authority opts for franchising, enhanced partnerships or nothing at all, the solution will be delivered by private bus companies, arms-length municipals, community transport and so on. Not the state. So, whatever the outcome of these schemes, one thing is for certain – we will have to work together.
Critical
All the while, as we talk about the ideology and who controls what, the real issue is funding. Buses are critically important to our society. Our economy depends on buses as does our environment and our communities. Buses are worthy of funding well beyond anything that the National Bus Strategy set out for – buses are an investment for our country.
How we deliver bus services will come best with a collaborative approach between operators and authorities. It would be wrong to place control in one set of hands, which is going from one extreme to another, perhaps. But it would also be wrong to say that everything that has happened since de-regulation in 1986 has been bad. Far from it.
We need a new world of positive culture that makes a partnership approach easier to bring about. The old ways will have to go. The territorial tribalism from large operators will need to shift. Local authorities will need to be more ambitious and less risk averse. We need to listen to each other to find new ways or working and new ways of delivering the best services. This is about challenging ourselves and old conventions. It will not be easy.
And the challenge is not just for buses. It is for all modes, which will have to work together. The rail industry must learn new ways to work with buses, a notoriously frustrating challenge of the past. We need to encourage and engage with active travel and recognise the vital role that all types of community transport play – both potentially vital in delivering solutions for first and last mile transport – bringing people together with shared aims that we can all believe in and share fruit from.
A true partnership will start in the community and build upwards. It will listen to people and bring together the absolute best of what we have got. The bus industry is full of talent and ideas and its enterprising spirit must not be dampened. Local authorities are full of ambition that has not been fully realised just yet. And the Government needs to know just how important buses are.
Up and down the country the picture is scant, varying greatly from place to place in local authorities alone. In some areas the challenges will be conquered with some ease but sadly in others this will not be the case for many reasons; lots of these are historical. But the challenge will have to be met, nevertheless.
The road ahead is hard, and we should not be under any illusion as to how devastating things will become. But we must look forward to reshaping and rebuilding. The status quo is not good enough and we will need to challenge every old convention to make sure that what we restore is far better, sustainable, and much more robust than before.
Kevin Carr
Kevin is a co-director of South Pennine Community Transport, which he helped found in 2015 with just one minibus. A member of the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport, he has been in public transport in one way or another since the days of deregulation, having started off in his early 20s as a driver for Yorkshire Traction. He then worked for K-Line, undertaking a relief supervisor’s role, eventually ending up as a Commercial Projects Manager for Yorkshire Tiger, before going on to found South Pennine Community Transport to provide public transport to the rural area of Yorkshire around Holmfirth.
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