Bus service cuts are leaving older people trapped at home | Politics | News

Elderly people are “in danger of losing their independence” due to bus service cuts. The Department for Transport “needs to ensure that older and disabled people are not excluded from bus travel”, MPs warned.

The number of people eligible for discounted fares using bus services is still 29% lower than before the Covid outbreak, a report by the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee has found, suggesting that many older people never returned to the habit of traveling after lockdown.

Two-thirds of older people cannot reach a hospital within 30 minutes by public transport, and cuts to services are part of the problem; A total of 5,000 routes have been closed in the last 10 years. Pressure group Later Life Ambitions told the Committee: “The lack or unavailability of suitable transport and its impact on older people is often overlooked as a cause of isolation and loneliness, with many unable to travel to meet friends or family.

“This isolation can increase significantly when one’s partner dies and the remaining partner (mostly a woman) cannot or has never driven.”

Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, chairman of the committee, said: “The use of bus services by older and disabled people has not seen the same post-COVID recovery as we have seen among fare-paying passengers – and the government has not done the necessary work to understand why. What we can continue to be sure of is that there are still numerous barriers to disabled people attempting to access bus services, and varying performance across the country is making services less reliable for older people who might otherwise be dependent on them.”

He welcomed the government’s promise to improve bus services but added: “There is much to welcome in the government’s ambitions to improve bus services, but vague ambitions do not imply a clear strategy.

“Only a clear vision from the center and guidance for councils on different service delivery models and appropriate accountability can stop further declines across the country. This Committee will also continue to challenge the Government on plans for how to reflect the additional challenges of funding rural areas. Government that does not follow our recommendations risks waiting in vain for reliable, accessible and safe buses to arrive, as many commuters do.”

In a new report, the inquiry warned that bus services had not been good enough for many years, especially for people in rural areas. Bus use had long been in decline before the Covid outbreak, but ridership numbers fell during lockdown and have still not fully recovered. There were 9% fewer bus passenger journeys in 2023-24 than in 2019-20, but the number of people paying full fares is closer to pre-Covid levels than the number of those entitled to discounts, such as the elderly and disabled.

MPs said the Ministry of Transport had failed to adequately explain why elderly and disabled people had not returned to buses to the same extent as other passengers since the outbreak and needed to investigate further.