To think children should be free on buses the same as OAPs

[P3onyPenny]

Our bus company used to charge £7 for a 10 mile adult ticket and £1 each for children which wasn't too bad. The £1 child ticket has now been scrapped and I've just paid £18 for me and 3 dc to travel 10 miles. I think that is extortionate. The Park and Ride is always filled by office workers and city parking is extortionate. I don't always have access to a car. During the holidays the bus was always full with a variety of ages and several children. Now it only appears to be OAPs on it. We were literally the only non OAPs travelling,I presume due to the cost. We live in a fairly rural area,our library is rarely open( unlike the city one) and we don't have the city shops or many amenities such as cinema,sports centre,big shops etc.

We'll just organise ourselves so I can drive into town,pay the extortionate parking and add to the congestion. Other families not so fortunate won't be able to do this and to be honest environmentally I don't think it should be encouraged anyway.

My parents have a brand new car and are far better off than us. It just seems daft that they get bus transport free and kids who don't have any income don't.

AIBU to think oap bus passes should be means tested with the money saved funding a child bus pass scheme? At the very least just for the holidays or even £1 a ticket scheme like Stagecoach ran before.

@FairyLightBlanket45
Free bus passes used to result in the fare - usually half a standard adult singe - being charged to the council issuing the bus pass. Therefore if you look at it that way the council tax payers are paying for it (no government funds for it to the council either).
(Things mayhave changed its a while since I worked in LA finance)

I've lived in various european cities over the past few years - in all of them, kids are either charged a token amount, or not charged at all (actually in the two token amount countries, it was common for them to waive the kids past without charging - not every time, but often).

I think that that actually works well - in Rome, as the best example, it's kids under 10 free - basically, if they can't travel unaccompanied, then they're not charged. This works well I think, because trying to get me and two kids through barriers with tickets, in a crowded station is a bit of a bugger (and more than once one of us has been left on the wrong side of a barrier when a ticket decided not to work in a place - which isn't great at all.)

The things is , it's not likely to change as the govt think that OAPs are more likely to vote conservative.

I live about 2 miles from my city centre. It's way too far to walk if you are then going to be walking all over the city centre to do your shopping.Plus it's unpleasant A roads without safe pavements etc- a horrible walk.
2 adults and 2 kids would pay £15:80 return!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I'm a single parent of 2. We pay an extra £1 and get a taxi- door to door, and at exactly the time we want it. Buses are for the rich round here- how ridiculous.

I'm a single parent of 2. We pay an extra £1 and get a taxi- door to door, and at exactly the time we want it. Buses are for the rich round here- how ridiculous.

I agree. Where I live a taxi is often the same price if there are two of you wanting to travel three miles and obviously more convenient. If there three people are taxi is cheaper. Unsurprisingly, my children say that only teenagers, OAPs and drunks use the buses.

Something has gone terribly wrong it is cheaper for a family to use a taxi than travel by bus.

Bit off topic but would it be cheaper to take a taxi / uber?

I would imagine it is pretty easy to to means test child benefit because it ipaid on income figures collected by HMRC aleady and paid by HMRC.

Local governent pays for bus passes and besides pensioners are often capital rich and income poor which is much more difficult to establish.

I undrstand the argument for giving elderly people bus passes (or transport tokens as they are in rural like ours) Elderly people have failin health and mobility, they often livealone and are prone to isolation.Growing old is something unavoidable

The argument for gving children free travel, when they already et a discount, I don't understand.Parents have income and they pay for their kids needs out of that. They do not expect the state to pay for food or clothes for them- why travel?

Flipntwist, I agree free travel for children is probably too much to ask.
I do feel it is unfair however that children's fares in many areas are almost as much as for adults.
Given that it is often lower income families who travel by bus, the cost of bus fares can stop them from enjoying days out.
Bus travel should be affordable by all who need it.

In London they are and most of the time it is not a problem - but come the holidays it is an absolute nightmare.

Self entitled, mainly mothers, whose screaming children need a good thrashing take over. Nappies get changed on seats, kids sit, whilst people on crutches and the elderly stand then I seriously object.

I pay to commute and did commute with both DCS every day to nursery at my work. Even they comment on how badly behaved kids are on the tube. They never took a seat when an adult was standing and we never used a pushchair!!

COI: have just come home with 2 families whose kids have run riot, screamed and taken up 10 seats.

Where I live, under 5’s are free then £1 per journey or £2 for an all day ticket for 5-16 year olds. I don’t mind paying £2 for my teenager to go meet his friends in the holidays.

There’s always been a disparity across areas on this. The county I grew up in used to charge literally half fare for kids - so 20 years ago it would cost me 85p each way for college. The neighbouring county, which houses our closest city (a mile to the border) had a standard fare of 15p for kids.

I do think there could be some standardisation.

When free bus travel for children was introduced in London, shortly afterwards bus fares for adults were increased. Children started going one or two stops by bus instead of walking, hardly good in tackling the level of childhood obesity.

I'd have a fixed fare for children, and for those of pensionable age..

Buses are extortionate here for adults and kids so nobody uses them if they can help it - on rate occasions when I don't have the car it's full of people on oap passes. Since Uber arrived in our city we usually just order a cab if we don't want to take the car - it's cheaper than the bus for 2!

I'm in London and children travel for free on buses. Rural and London bus services aren't really comparable as London buses are predominately for short journeys and not 10 mile+ journeys.

If I was to attempt a 10.2 mile journey via London bus from my zone 5 to Central London with 3 children it would only cost £4.50 but require 5 different buses and at least 2 hours 20 mins travel time

Probably more comparable would be via train which would be a single direct route and take 40 minutes. That would cost £16.

I think your bus company will receive a payment each time an OAP pass is used. If the pass is removed and they generally stopped travelling, that would leave a funding hole that would need to be filled by further fare rises or a reduction in services. Unfortunately your local bus is not going to have the general income that the likes of TFL have in a city of 9 million people allowing them to provide free child travel.

YABU to suggest means testing the OAP pass.
YANBU it is to expensive for Children.