South Yorkshire: £5m mayoral bailout for school bus routes

Oliver Coppard said until the Mayoral authority has more powers over buses, he will "protect as many services as possible"

Threatened school bus services in South Yorkshire are to be bailed out with a rescue package of more than £5m.

Planned cuts to commercial bus routes which children use to go to and from school would be reversed, South Yorkshire's Mayor Oliver Coppard said.

Budget reserves would be used to protect services which were heavily used by children in mornings and afternoons, Mr Coppard pledged.

However, not all at-risk bus services could be funded, he added.

Mr Coppard said: "I hope this emergency funding will reassure students and their families, as well as the schools themselves, that we will do whatever we can to keep these vital services running."

The first cuts came into effect on Sunday, with more services expected to be withdrawn later this year, including commercially-operated school buses which carry children who pay 80p fares.

Government funding for operators to get through the Covid pandemic was due to stop in October, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

'Broken system'

Most of South Yorkshire's buses are run by private companies, free to decide where and when they run.

When bus companies withdraw services, South Yorkshire Mayoral Combined Authority can pay other companies to run the route.

However, in the most recent tender process, a number of routes received no bids from operators.

The planned bus service cuts signified a "broken system...failing passengers", Mr Coppard said, adding that they were "biggest and most damaging cuts for a generation".

He said the combined authority currently had limited powers over bus services, but was "doing everything" to speed up the process of getting the right powers in place".

School buses for children who get free bus passes from their council are already funded by the mayoral combined authority, so are not affected by the cuts.