To think free bus passes should be reformed

[Ll81]

Where I am the bus is so expensive it' usually has very few paying customers. services are being cut as the funding for the free bus pass has been cut and this was one given reason for raising fares and cutting services. Further compounding the problems.

To get to sign on from here is £16 and two busses. No help for anyone on low incomes or JSA.

In London tfl has over a billion pound debt, but still give out the freedom pass.

I've no problem with people that can't afford to run a car getting help with massively subsidised transport costs. For pensioners the calculation is already done for state pension so next to no means testing cost. Then people that need help could pay 95% less for the cost and people with money pay full cost. People often don't value "free" stuff.

The current system is killing off busses, espically in rural and semi rural areas.

So that would cost me £1.20 return for the 2 buses I take to get to the station and another £1.20 return for the train to central London? And more from the terminus to where I want to go on the bus/tube? I hop on and off buses all the time for a couple of stops. Quicker and my knees aren't what they were.

Lots of buses in London and Tfl have concessionary fares for young people and students. Rural areas should be aiming to match Tfl instead of a race to the bottom.

Wonderful idea, so the many elderly that rightly don’t drive anymore (because they recognise that they aren’t quite as safe as they were in their younger days) start using their cars again. Can you see where I’m going with this?

If you are recognised by the DVLA as being medically unsafe to drive then you would become eligible for a disabled person's Freedom Pass, so elderly people in that situation would still be able to get a free bus pass.

The age at which you get a Freedom Pass in London is being raised to 66 over the next few years. It used to be limited to after 0900, but is now any time.

It was a GLC initiative originally, which passed over to boroughs when GLC was abolished and is now back with the Mayor.

It's funded by council tax (essentially buying passes for qualifying residents, at a rate which is periodically renegotiated - sometimes quite heatedly). And yes you do get one at any age if you are medically barred from driving (unless that medical reason is alcohol or recreational drug related)