Bus fare cap will rise to £3 for a single journey - I say what a shambles

One of the headlines from before the autumn Budget was that the price of a single journey on a bus would no longer be capped at £2. Instead, the cap will rise to £3 in 2025.

Whilst FirstBus has said that no decision has been made in regards to whether the price of a ticket will be increased, the fact that it said it favours “a staggered approach” should be taken as an early warning sign of what many are expecting to be on the way. The price of a single journey probably will increase in Bristol.

The Government says a £22 billion “black hole” in finances meant that the cap would be raised. On a local level, Bristol City Council announced that millions raised from the Clean Air Zone would be able to fund bus services in certain areas of Bristol.

And to all of this, I say: “What a shambles.” Look, I don’t think many of us expected the £2 cap on single journeys to stay, it was too good to be true, however, if the idea is to plug a shortfall in the finances, raising the price of a ticket, a notable barrier to many from using public transport, is surely counter-intuitive.

I’m all for providing better transport, and having better bus services is essential for the city with a notorious reputation for the reliability of buses, so what’s the point of upping prices and turning people away from using the said transport? To make money, people have to use the service, right?

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It is a great job that new bus services could be funded by the council and I genuinely applaud the effort. It is a shame that less people would use it due to the price difference.

Some will argue that a £1 difference isn’t a big deal. But when a £2 single, which turns into a £4 journey there and back from the shops, or from work, becomes £6 a day - those with limited income will undoubtedly struggle. Take a working person, using two buses a day, every weekday for four weeks (i.e. a month), the price will go up from £80 to £120.

I can already hear some also arguing that the extension of the Birthday Bus scheme will help those with some of the costs, as Dan Norris said it was “more efficient”. I’m sure the vast majority of people will disagree, it isn’t like everyone has a monthly birthday after all.

Here at Bristol Live, we’ve campaigned for Better Buses for Bristol, and through the work of myself and my colleagues, we’ve raised the issues of buses by highlighting different areas of Bristol and speaking about their struggles with the current transport. I can’t see this rise of the bus fare cap being good news for Bristolians on top of this.

The money generated from the new cap would ideally raise money to better improve transport across our city, if that is in the long-term then that may make the world of difference. What about now?

What about places without a bus in Bristol, where the first chance of getting a dedicated bus service would be in April? That is three months of a more expensive single journey, already inconvenient enough, but an added strain on finances.

What about the reliability of buses? I don’t need to mention to the people of Bristol how late some buses are, or the amount of cancellations people have to endure, will the £1 increase per journey fix that when it is implemented? It’s unlikely, even more so when talking about an immediate effect.

It’s a shame, if buses were actually decent everywhere in Bristol then the price cap on single journeys could be less of an issue. If our transport system was up to standard, knowing we’d get to work on time or spend less time waiting in the cold and the rain, maybe we would pay a little more knowing it would maintain the good we have.

But how can it be justified when buses in Bristol still cause an issue to many and yet the public are to fork out a little more just to use the transport? Buses should be free, or at the very least, subsidised so the costs are low, as far as I am concerned, no one should be paying more for a bus service which we don’t even know will be coming to our stop.

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