Commission’s North East bus report shows why remedies won’t work, say PTEs

Last month’s Competition Commission report on the activities of two bus operators in the north-east of England proves the Commission’s remedies for Britain’s bus market won’t work, say PTEs. But the bus operators say the Commission has misinterpreted the evidence.

Andrew Forster

02 December 2011

The Competition Commission has been trying to get to the bottom of why there is so little head-to-head competition

At the beginning of November, and three weeks after announcing its provisional remedies to boost competition in Britain’s bus markets (outside London), the Competition Commission (CC) published arguably its most gripping read from the thousands of pages of evidence and analysis its two-year inquiry has generated. The Commission said its account of the activities of two large operators in the north-east of England, Go North East and Arriva North East, showed the operators were...