Opinion - Why climate change group has called a public meeting about Stratford’s bus services
By Stephen Norrie and Janey Palmer
Stratford Climate Action
IN December 2023, the Herald ran a feature highlighting the poor quality of our local bus services, including regular cancellations, old dirty buses, breakdowns, and outdated information at bus stops. A spokesperson for Stagecoach claimed they had overcome a shortage of drivers, caused by the Covid pandemic, implying that the reliability issues this caused, at least, were now a thing of the past. Have things improved?
This summer we asked visitors to the Net Zero Climate Hub for their views of local bus services – 53 per cent of the people we talked to were regular or occasional bus users. People commented about the “constant problems” that “put many people off using them”. One respondent said: “I have regularly waited for over an hour for buses that are late or don’t turn up.” Another added: “They are irregular and infrequent. It’s impossible to plan anything, and there’s a high risk of getting stranded.”
Perhaps this is overstating negative experiences. But if the negative experiences are frequent enough, they can put people off using the buses altogether. Someone even told us their son had walked from Stratford to Bidford for a dentist’s appointment because he couldn’t be confident the bus would get him there on time.
Warwickshire County Council’s Bus Service Improvement Plan (updated in 2024) contains more extensive surveys, confirming this picture: only 67 per cent of buses arrived punctually last year, and only 0.6 per cent of people in Stratford district use the buses to get to work. How can we encourage people to cut carbon emissions by using public transport if the bus services are so unreliable?
There’s a good case that to get people out of their cars, we need to be spending more on increasing bus frequency. But when the operator, Stagecoach – which provides 90 per cent of services in Warwickshire – can’t provide an adequate service on the routes it already runs (and for which it receives huge public subsidies), surely we need to be looking at alternatives.
Take the issue of driver recruitment and retention. Someone told us that when asked why a previous bus hadn’t turned up, a driver said that “probably the driver never turned up for work”. Such experiences can lead some people to blame lazy bus drivers. But according to the RMT union, and Leamington MP Matt Western, who has sponsored a Bill on the topic, the issues are more structural. Drivers are poorly paid and often have to work longer hours than, for example, lorry drivers. The long hours cause back, neck and shoulder pains, forcing them to take time off work. Privatisation of public services has often led to reduced wages and conditions for workers, and such treatment is hardly likely to encourage a strong commitment to public service among workers. This seems to make a strong case for public ownership, or at least the kind of regulated franchise system exemplified by Manchester’s ‘Bee Network’, brought in under powers the government is planning to extend across to all local transport authorities.
There are other things the county council could do. Plans are in place to introduce simpler ticketing, for example, and some other improvements. One area they could maybe do better concerns bus stops, which they recognise are often shabby, lacking adequate shelter and seating, and where “real time information” about buses is difficult to access. The council plans to provide QR codes at bus stops, with links to the information online. What about people who don’t have a suitable phone, or who can’t get a good signal? Many other towns have electronic signage at bus stops: West Sussex council has a long list of communities on their website with such signs at their bus stops, usually with a special audio facility to aid passengers with visual impairments. Why is Warwickshire not doing the same?
If you’re concerned about Stratford’s bus services, all are welcome at the next Stratford Climate Action meeting when we will be talking to Cllr Jan Matecki, portfolio holder for transport and planning at Warwickshire County Council. It is on 22nd January, 7.30pm, at the Net Zero climate hub, 30 Meer Street, Stratford. We’d also like to collect local people’s stories about the buses to help us raise awareness of the issues. Email us at info@stratfordclimate. org, or call in at the hub during opening hours (10am-4pm, Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday). We’d also be interested in hearing the perspectives of bus drivers.