Are ‘robber baron’ bus companies really to blame for concessionary travel chaos?

Councillors have been angered by rulings from the Department for Transport’s independent arbiter which require them to pay bus companies more money for participating in concessionary travel schemes. But while they point the finger at the bus company ‘robber barons’, Ben Colson suggests that the facts are not on their side

“Free fares fiasco on the buses” screamed the editor’s comment in the Manchester Evening News of February 22. More locally, for me, blazoned across the front page of the Norwich Evening News of February 12 we “bus companies [are] accused of overcharging”.

Read a little further and you’ll see quoted councillor this or quoted councillor that condemning the bus operator. That’s not new, but is it fair game? Probably never before has it reached such...

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