How will the VAT cut be funded?

Whitewavemark2

Most bus fares to be capped at £2.

Still going in the right direction of travel😊

They are already capped in our council area and there is a £1 single fare for under 19s.

The change to £2 starts in Jan 2027.
AB was heard to announce that it will be there for the whole of 2027.
Meaning . . .

Everyone wants things to be better then they start going on about where the money will come from. This thé governments job, not ours. We do our bit, now they should do theirs, on our behalf.

LemonJam

AB has only been in the job for a couple of days! His new to post cabinet minsters just coming to terms with their briefs. I sense huge impatience in the air- but I guess that was always going to be the case.

I wouldn't expect all funding streams to be spelt out in fine detail at this stage. Some posters are happy not knowing where funding is coming from, some happy to wait for a more detailed budget statement and some that are going to be impatient with the new LP leader and announcements anyway.

AB is seasoned and experienced and will no doubt steer his course and his cabinet's course, in a planned way and in a realistic, step by step timescale.

Looking at the UK, it isn't a democracy that only demands instant gratification. However, modern media, political incentives, and cultural expectations have increased pressure on governments to produce rapid, visible results.

It makes sustained, long-term policymaking more difficult, even when it would ultimately benefit the country and I'm not sure how you change the current culture.

Whitewavemark2

Most bus fares to be capped at £2.

Still going in the right direction of travel😊

What good is that for those in areas with poor bus services, like one bus a week to a market town?

Good point. He should cut the initiative immediately, obviously.

Alternatively, if the buses get used more, the initiative could grow to reopen the routes that were cut when Thatcher privatised public transport, as I suggested upthread.

Maybe it could be funded with the money saved by cutting the amount of taxpayers' money given to landlords and to employers who don't pay their staff enough to live without benefits?

Primrose53

Whitewavemark2

Most bus fares to be capped at £2.

Still going in the right direction of travel😊

What good is that for those in areas with poor bus services, like one bus a week to a market town?

So, just to clarify, if everyone can't use a bus at a reduced rate, no one should be able to. Is that what you're saying?

I agree we need more actual bus runs but what that means differs from place to place to place. A towns needs are very different to rural needs which are different again from Metropolitan cities. Another reason for the proposed devolution.

We could also do with reliable buses. We look as though we are fairly well served with buses locally but DH & I have had several planned 2 bus journeys spoiled by one or the other of them not turning up.

I hadn't used buses since my late 20s and this is something that just didn't happen then.

The bus fares near us used to be capped at £2. Who changed it to £3?

In the Lake District there are several villages that no longer have bus services. So getting to a dentist, doctor, supermarket or work relies on access to, and the ability to drive a car. not only that, but tourism relies on people from other areas and countries getting area tickets to get around, and that is very much curtailed these days.

One of the reasons for this is that so many houses have been bought to rent out as holiday lets, and the people renting them have cars, so locals are thinner on the ground. As a result, the buses are not supported as they used to be, and as a result of that many older or less well-off people have moved away, and the communities have died. Wages have always been low, as the area has heavily reliant on tourism.

Consequently, hospitality is struggling, colleges and employers on industrial estates struggle as people can't access them easily, and so on.

It's not just NI and minimum wage hikes that get in the way of economic growth - things like transport play a role, too.

I have long felt that if public transport were free, reliable, clean and safe across the country, the investment would be repaid in no time.

Mollygo

The bus fares near us used to be capped at £2. Who changed it to £3?

I think the £2 initiative came to an end, and the need to let people know about costings meant that it went up to £3.

£3 was less than half of what I used to pay to get to work, even with a weekly ticket, so it was still a bargain for many. Less so for me, as I got a bus pass just as the fares got cheaper😂. Story of my life, really.

It’s OK. I asked DH and he said KS changed it to £3 in October 2024.

Ah, well that will have made the point you were hoping to make, won't it?

My point still stands though.

Doodledog

Ah, well that will have made the point you were hoping to make, won't it?

My point still stands though.

You mean you didn’t know either?

Now we know that the government can create whatever money it needs , I’m surprised that it was necessary for the LP to up the cost.

I don’t agree that ‘we know’ about governments being able to create money.

My understanding is that this is a point of view- much as needing to know whether funding is readily identifiable before ambitions can be declared is a perspective, rather than a requirement.

Yes, I ‘knew’ that the change from £2 to £3 happened under KS’s leadership (as did you), but as I say, my point about the sniping and attempts at point scoring stand.

The first subsidy was funded by the massive increase in VAT revenue from petrol price hikes, so when fuel prices went down there was less in the pot. Now prices have hiked again, this can be funded

It is very easy to look up this information.

To help with the cost of living crisis, on 3 September 2022 the previous government announced a £2 cap on most single bus fares outside London.

It started from 1 January 2023 and was due to run for just three month until 31 March 2023. That was estimated to cost £60 million.

www.gov.uk/government/speeches/transport-update-2-bus-fare-cap-on-a-single-bus-ticket

On 31 May 2023 it was announced that it would be extended to 31 October 2023 and then £2.50 until the end of 2024. That was estimated to cost £200 million.

www.gov.uk/government/news/government-extends-2-bus-fare-cap-and-protects-vital-services

On 28 October 2024 the new government announced the cap from 1 January 2025 would be £3. That was estimated to cost £150 million.

www.gov.uk/government/news/over-1-billion-to-boost-bus-services-across-the-country-as-bus-fares-capped-at-3

Fare cap extension comes on top of nearly £925 million invested to deliver high quality services and protect vital bus routes up and down the country.

Under the inherited plans, funding for the current capon bus fares had been due to expire at the end of 2024, withfares set to soar by as much as £13 for the Leeds to Scarborough route, unless the government intervened to keep fares down.

www.gov.uk/government/news/over-1-billion-to-boost-bus-services-across-the-country-as-bus-fares-capped-at-3

From March 2020 to the end of its term, the previous government invested £3.5 billion in bus networks. Labour have already invested over a billion since coming to power.

DaisyAnneReturns

Thank you everyone for so many well informed answers. I'm not sure you need the OPs sneered at "experts" when we have this quality of research!

Aspirations are often quoted by politicians - even those the OP might support. I would hate to find we had a party in power which didn't have any aspirations for those worst off in society.

Tongue in cheek?

Do you mean 'I am not sure you need the OP's sneer at "experts", ?
Your original sentence does not make sense otherwise.

eazybee

Do you mean 'I am not sure you need the OP's sneer at "experts", ?
Your original sentence does not make sense otherwise.

🤣🤣🤣

DaisyAnneReturns

LemonJam

AB has only been in the job for a couple of days! His new to post cabinet minsters just coming to terms with their briefs. I sense huge impatience in the air- but I guess that was always going to be the case.

I wouldn't expect all funding streams to be spelt out in fine detail at this stage. Some posters are happy not knowing where funding is coming from, some happy to wait for a more detailed budget statement and some that are going to be impatient with the new LP leader and announcements anyway.

AB is seasoned and experienced and will no doubt steer his course and his cabinet's course, in a planned way and in a realistic, step by step timescale.

Looking at the UK, it isn't a democracy that only demands instant gratification. However, modern media, political incentives, and cultural expectations have increased pressure on governments to produce rapid, visible results.

It makes sustained, long-term policymaking more difficult, even when it would ultimately benefit the country and I'm not sure how you change the current culture.

I agree DAR. Yet it's sustained, incremental, long-term policymaking that the country badly needs whether it's willing to be patient or not, trusting or not, hopeful or not. The reality AB is the leader of the party that won the country's mandate to govern for 5 yer period- three more to run.

AB's only course of action I would suggest is to steer his cabinet and his incremental long term plans forward regardless of impatience and modern media noise. He can do little to change that in the immediate or short term, particularly with imminent summer recess.

AB has shown in Manchester he's fairly adept at media management. It will be much more difficult as PM on a wider scale admittedly- but his only option is to plough on. Aside from minsters and other allies that may have lost their roles in AB's cabinet reshuffle and bitterness from a few- AB has enormous support from his MPs. Thats a good start for him in his hugely challenging new job.

He doesn’t know.

tattygran14

He doesn’t know.

?

The Telegraph is reporting that AB is suspending all early releases, pending review.

GrannyGravy13

The Telegraph is reporting that AB is suspending all early releases, pending review.

Oops wrong thread 🤦‍♀️