To worry that free bus passes won't exist in the future

[Downtroddenhousingass]

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6685043/Half-bus-routes-scrapped-650million-blackhole-boom-free-passes.html#article-6685043

Looks like they are already having issues with funding them now. I've still got 30 years until I get mine.

The scheme might be gone by then I'm worried

All benefits are means tested. So why aren’t bus passes. Tv licence

Oh because those people are older. And they are a huge swaythe of the voting population

Correct.

I do actually agree, means testing is rubbish. But it’s arbitrary how it’s doled out.

Personally I think everyone should get free travel or no one should.

They're not getting anything free. They've paid tax and national insurance for 40 plus years to get them.

The vast majority of people cost more than they contribute. Their tax and NI has covered some things but the bus passes are being paid for by younger people now, not coming from some imaginary pot of money they saved.

Means testing might cost more, but that argument gets wheeled out a lot as it pertains to older people and not younger people.

*If they didn't work outside the home, their husbands did.

HTH*

But one person never contributed enough to cover economic inactivity and freebies for 30+ years for both, and plenty of the rest of us are getting sick of funding it. HTH.

If means testing was so cost inefficient then why don’t we just have an national benefit of say 1000 p/m which every adult receives

It would actually save a fortune. But this is about good people (old) and bad people (feckless young) deserving and undeserving.
It’s all psychological, it’s nothing much to do with money.

But older people now paid for the previous generation's bus passes. And pensions. And TV licences. It was ever thus. If I take more out than I've paid in I'll have to live to be about 120.

If I take more out than I've paid in I'll have to live to be about 120.

Thing is the high earners who actually put in more than they take out don't need 'free' bus passes, because they were high earners. If they need one, it's very likely they were net 'takers' from the system, which is fine and dandy, but let's not argue that they are owed a bus pass because of contributions.

Young people now are struggling to afford a roof over their head.

People who don't need bus passes don't, on the whole, use them. It will be a cold day in hell before I get on a bus when I could drive.

That's just not true. You might not, many do.

They've bonkers then. Btw how do you know?

Bus passes are no use without buses

why should those who can afford to have cars get free travel when teenagers who are too young to drive do not

I can only speak for London but parking is atrocious so you'd be bonkers to drive. Many older people give up their cars.

Of course more people will use them who actually need them but it's very expensive at a time when young people are being squeezed.

I can only speak for London but parking is atrocious so you'd be bonkers to drive. Many older people give up their cars.
Whereas outside London where buses are deregulated
one bus per week leaves you trapped at home if you DO NOT DRIVE

It's true that rural and northern public transport is fucking dire.

Thing is the high earners who actually put in more than they take out don't need 'free' bus passes, because they were high earners. If they need one, it's very likely they were net 'takers' from the system, which is fine and dandy, but let's not argue that they are owed a bus pass because of contributions.

^ this.

With RTI (real time information) that DWP gets for all claimants from HMRC, as well as richer data from bank transactions, means testing is not difficult or costly like it was 5 years ago. The reason the government haven't removed bus passes, TV licences etc. from the older population is purely down to votes. Older people are more likely to vote, ergo they must be kept happy. Until younger people actually go to the polls in significant numbers we will always end up with crappy policies that benefit the older generation.

London is definitely a special case. I wouldn't drive there. Everywhere else you get your bus pass at the age you get your pension, I gather Freedom passes arrive at 60. Public transport is such rubbish here, you'd have to be a masochist to use it.

My MIL is very concerned about this, she really relies on her bus pass as she doesn’t drive. I am entitled to a bus pass due to my disability, but I haven’t bothered applying as I usually drive to appointments etc. It’s very rare that I would take a bus.

My parents get one, neither of them need it, they both have plenty of money. But as a PP said until the youth start turning out to vote the older population will continue to be the winners. No one pays in enough for a free bus if they actually need one, they will have been net takers.

Travis please read my link The tired old rhetoric that pensioners arent touched isnt true Do you actually take any notice of the news?

Yep Totes winning.

mzolobajluk.wordpress.com/2019/02/04/pensioners-now-to-be-sanctioned/

Public transport in London is pretty good imo and everyone gets a free pass at the age of 60, regardless of whether they need it or not. And I say again, how can the country afford free prescriptions to everyone over 60? It's ridiculous

More children than pensioners live in poverty. More working age people than pensioners live in poverty.

That isn't to say there isn't poverty in old age, of course there is. But extra benefits to older people aren't based on need, they're based on voting. Which is why young people and people with disabilities are getting less and less.

No, the reason for that is austerity, in other words Tory ideology.

And the Tories (and fucking Brexit) were voted for statistically by?