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/diary0012 Tuesday 15 January 2002
Don't forget the buses
Good ol’ Guardian! The news has been dominated by turmoil in the rail industry, if overshadowed by the absurd coverage given to Prince Harry’s little binge. This has been breast-beating time for Tony Blair, and must do better commitments from Stephen Byers.
They are doing the right thing. They are both following my prescribed policy, set out last week in my Letter to John Birt They are planning to concentrate investment in the busiest Intercity and metropolitan routes, and forget the remainder. For everyone else, develop the highway system. And in due course, require top-level travellers to pay very much more for their rail travel. In the case of commuters, the long-term effect would only be a gradual relative diminution of property values. At present, commuting fares are so low that people can afford to travel huge daily distances and still have money left over for houses in excess of £100,000. That is absurd. Low rail fares are subsidising high house prices.
But it was only The Guardian that reminded Blair about the other half of the equation, namely the buses. Within the arcane rubric of English society, buses are Non-U , working class. Rail is the mode of the metropolitan
Tuesday's Guardian letterwriters have taken up the cudgels for buses, too > Check them out
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middle classes, the Pooters whose allegiance Labour considers it must cultivate. Buses and coaches are
lower class, infra-dig, and must therefore fight for political attention. On the buses exemplified English class attitudes to bus transport. On the other hand, Our dear Queen travels by rail, does she not?
This is a nasty residual class issue , which Labour has not yet confronted. Rail, carrying perhaps 8% of the travelling public, hogs the limelight. Why should railway waiting-rooms command such prime ministerial attention? The miserable bus-stops of England deserve the greater attention. Our buses, carrying a larger proportion of the travelling public, are the neglected poor relations of public transport.
Our country is crying out for high-grade buses, and more of them. Also better roads, and better highway management, to ensure their smooth operation as a public service. Tony Blair has got off the immediate rail hook, by committing £67,000,000,000 to rail investment, over the next ten years. But the greater priority should be improvement of public bus transport, to meet the travelling needs of ordinary people.
Only The Guardian remembered to say that.
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