Concessionary Bus Travel Bill [Lords]

I thank hon. Members for their contributions to this debate, which is important, not least because it is about giving older and disabled people throughout the country better access to bus travel. I am delighted by the wide support that the Bill is enjoying in the House, but also intrigued by the requests from those on the Opposition Benches for many extra millions of pounds to extend the scheme still further, as the Bill is in fact about geographical scope. Buses are at the heart of our commitment to cut congestion and pollution. Because they are at the heart of every community—taking people to work, to the shops and to see friends and family around the corner and throughout the country—buses are for me, in short, a social justice issue. That is why the Government’s extension of concessionary fares coverage is so important. Eleven million older and disabled people can already enjoy free local off-peak travel, but not everyone can get to where they want or to see who they want just within their communities. Grandchildren might live 30 miles away or more and hospitals can be just over the local authority boundary, as we have heard in examples today. The Government have listened. By removing the issue of local authority boundaries, which are indeed an artificial barrier to free bus travel, we are extending freedom and extending people’s horizons. We will continue to work closely with a wide range of stakeholders—local government, bus operators and groups representing older and disabled people—to achieve that important improvement. I shall now turn to the specific issues raised by hon. Members. The definition of a bus, an open-top bus and a coach was the subject of a flurry of questions. If I may enlighten the House, we use the term ““public service vehicle””, which is defined in other legislation, and I would be happy to supply the references. Earlier, we were talking about ladies and gentlemen of a certain age, but in this case we are talking about vehicles of a certain size—buses and minibuses that carry passengers for fares. The hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) was particularly interested in the issue of coaches, although the hon. Members for Uxbridge (Mr. Randall) and for Rochdale (Paul Rowen) also raised the issue. Coaches will be obliged to provide the national concession where they provide local services as part of their routes—where sections of their routes have stops less than 15 miles apart and are sufficiently accessible to members of the public. Those local services will be registered as such, and do not include long inter-urban journeys with no local bus stops or services marketed exclusively for tourists.