Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of minimum service standards for cross county bus services.

Local Transport Authorities (LTAs) already often work closely together when tendering routes that cross shared boundaries and in delivering their Bus Service Improvement Plans (BSIP). There are also requirements set out in the Transport Act 2000 for LTAs to take account of the effect of an Enhanced Partnership on neighbouring areas and for bus policies on bus services in neighbouring LTA areas to be considered when developing their franchising arrangements.

The government has updated its bus franchising guidance to LTAs to make clear that they should consider cross-boundary services during any franchising assessment process, including in the commercial case where they should set out how they intend to facilitate cross-boundary services to deliver relevant BSIP outcomes and targets in both authorities’ areas.

The government introduced the Bus Services (No.2) Bill on 17 December which puts the power over local bus services back in the hands of local leaders, and is intended to ensure bus services reflect the needs of the communities that rely on them right across England, including services that cross local authority boundaries.

The Bill would give franchising authorities greater scope to grant service permits to operators wishing to provide non-franchised services which enter a franchising area from another area. Franchising authorities will be able to take account of these proposed cross-boundary services’ benefits in all the areas where the service would run, not just the franchising area as before. This will enable franchising authorities to better harness the additionality the market can provide in delivering these important services and take a more holistic approach to cross-boundary bus provision.