AN inquiry by the Traffic Commissioner into bus services provided by Stagecoach has been said to be of ‘no benefit’ to passengers in rural areas.

Dawlish town and district councillor Alison Foden fears the contents of the report from the commissioner could signal the demise of bus service provision outside of cities.

Bus regulator the Traffic Commissioner was called in by Devon County Council in response to complaints about Stagecoach services.

But the outcome of the inquiry has been criticised for failing to tackle the company’s ‘unreliable’ services.

The commissioner has ordered the operator to provide free bus travel to passengers in Exeter over two weekends in December and to employ a dedicated member of staff at Exeter bus station, costing an estimated £70,000.

Cllr Foden, who works for the NHS and uses bus services from Dawlish regularly, has called on Newton Abbot MP Anne Marie Morris and Central Devon MP Mel Stride to urge the Government to reconsider its funding support for bus services.

She said: ‘I realise that the current focus is on economic growth but to enable people to get to work and access shops and markets and employment sites, it is essential that we have and maintain a regular, reliable, efficient and wide-ranging public bus service in Devon.’

The Traffic Commissioner’s public inquiry only looked at complaints provided as evidence relating to services supported by Devon County Council.

Complaints concerning commercial services were referred direct to Stagecoach.

Cllr Foden said: ‘Hence the complaints that my work colleagues in the NHS and I sent in regarding the bus services we use each week to get to work at the hospital, including the 2 and 57, were sent just to Stagecoach Devon and not the Traffic Commissioner.

‘Therefore our complaints about the poor service, frequent cancellations and unreliability are being ignored.’

She said in the last week along, while working overtime, two buses on the half hourly number 2 service she was waiting for were cancelled in a row.

This meant she was left waiting one hour and 20 minutes for the next bus.

She explained: ‘These bus services, to name just two, are the longer and more rural routes that many people depend on to get to work, school, college, social activities.’

But she said the Traffic Commissioner report ‘worries me greatly’.

It states the operation of bus services became a commercial matter for operators and that competition legislation ‘constrains an operator’s ability to use more profitable services to subsidise those that may in themselves operate at a loss’.

It went on that it is longer, more rural routes which make the least money but that when operators reduce those services ‘it is doing what parliament intended to happen 40 years ago’.

Cllr Foden asked: ‘Is this the beginning of the end of public service bus provision outside of cities?’

While the commissioner’s ruling is ‘welcome’, she asked how it benefits a future, reliable bus service on all routes, including rural routes and people living outside of the Exeter travel zone.

Cllr Foden also questioned whether passengers who had been delayed, missed ‘vital’ appointments, lost work hours and suffered hours of waiting at bus stops would be compensated.

She pointed out that Devon County Council received only £14 million from the Department for Transport under the Bus Service Improvement Plan having bid for £34 million funding.

She has asked both MPs to appeal to the Secretary of State for Transport to reconsider how the BSIP funding was allocated with a view to making it fairer and proportionate.