'˜Sword of Damocles' hanging over bus operators, meeting hears

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Private bus operators in Leeds are 'drinking in the last chance saloon', the head of an influential council committee has warned at a heated meeting in Civic Hall.

Leeds City Council’s transport scrutiny committee was hearing about plans to improve bus services and boost the number of bus passengers in the region.

The Leeds Transport Strategy, which was released by the council back in June, included a target of doubling bus passengers in the city over the next 10 years.

But the meeting heard latest figures had in fact shown a decrease in passengers, prompting some members of the panel to speculate as to how realistic this target was.

Coun Paul Truswell (Lab), who was chairing the meeting, argued it was impossible to increase bus passengers while operators were cutting the number of services.

He said: “The last figures we got showed patronage had actually reduced.”

He later added: “The only way we can increase patronage is to increase connectivity between communities and until we grow that, we are not going to increase patronage. This needs a hell of a lot of investment, and this needs to come from the bus operators.

“Services have been chopped and changed. In many respects, I welcome the attempt to work in partnership.

“But the message that needs to go out to our private operator colleagues, is that they are drinking in the last chance saloon as far as we are concerned.

“We need to reiterate that there is a Sword of Damocles hanging over your head.”

The meeting was to discuss Bus 18, an informal partnership between West Yorkshire Combined Authority (WYCA), which oversees transport and infrastructure projects; and bus operators, to decide on what future bus services will look like.

But committee members were keen to focus on why Leeds wasn’t seeing the dramatic rise in passengers that would be needed to meet the city’s transport strategy plans, with taxi app and the reliability of services both blamed.

Coun Neil Buckley (Con) told the meeting: “Uber is so second nature and so attractive to young people – it is not going to go away.

“We have been told about the targets of passenger growth – I ask not to make anyone feel embarrassed, but are those targets still realistic?

“Is it coming to a point where they need to be slightly adjusted?