Having helped kill off the TIF/congestion-charge bid, Blackley MP Graham Stringer is hard at work on his own “plan B” for public transport in Greater Manchester.
Step 1: attack bus companies for price rises
Step 2: use this as a lever to persuade councils, and the passenger transport executive, to use new powers to re-regulate the buses.
Graham has just laid down an early day motion challenging First Bus over fare increases of up to 10.7 per cent (at a time when the company has recorded six-monthly profits of £180m).
The EDM then calls on the relevant authorities to “begin giving consideration to consulting local people on the possibility of using new powers in the Local Transport Act 2008 to establish quality contracts and remove the ability of bus operators to impose fare increases of this scale”.
“This is the first step in plan B to improve pubic transport in Greater Manchester,” says Graham.

This entry was posted on Monday, January 19th, 2009 at 12:39 pm and is filed under Congestion charge, Transport. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.