CPRE responds to the Transport Committee’s rural buses report

The Transport Committee’s report makes clear that, without dedicated support in government policy for rural bus networks, ‘historic disparities in funding and service provision will persist’.  

Along with the committee, CPRE calls on the government to support rural bus services with a guaranteed service level and a rural weighting in its revised Bus Service Improvement Plan funding formula. This would mean rural communities get a fair proportion of funding in spite of the higher per-passenger costs and structural challenges associated with rural buses.

In Ireland, a minimum service guarantee of three trips per day to a nearby town saw rural bus use increase by 70% in just one year.

In our evidence to the committee, we showed that more than half of England’s small towns are in transport deserts. Outside large urban areas, people who can’t afford a car face social isolation as well as reduced access to education and work. These people face dwindling services that further entrench inequality and harm national efforts to reach net zero by 2030.