Haud The Bus - Demand Better Buses

Bus passengers across Dumfries and Galloway are fed up with being treated like second class citizens.  Inadequate information on last-minute timetable changes, high fares and poorly maintained and unreliable vehicles are scuppering the travel plans of people reliant on bus services.  

Scottish Greens have three demands: 

• Up-to-date information at the bus stops
• Reliable, affordable and safe services
• Bringing bus services back into public ownership 

Thousands of people across Dumfries and Galloway rely on bus services for essential journeys.  Around a quarter of households in the region do not own a private car; add to that the elderly and young people who don’t drive and you have a large slice of the population who need decent, reliable public transport to get where they want to go.

Timetables at bus stops on the 500 route between Stranraer and Dumfries are often two years old and give details of services which no longer run.  Current timetables are only available online - useless if you’re at the bus stop and don’t have a smart phone, or even a signal for your smart phone.   

High fares go towards generous salaries and bonuses for company directors and profits for shareholders, while council tax payers foot the bill for subsidies to keep essential services running.  Badly maintained vehicles, due to profit-driven cost-cutting, cause late running and cancellations. These problems are repeated across the region and on other routes and add up to a lot of frustration, missed appointments and abandoned travel plans.

Laura Moodie, lead Holyrood candidate for South Scotland, said: “Good public transport is vital to help meet Scotland’s climate change targets, and to give equal job and education opportunities for all.  Scottish Greens won the right to free bus travel for young people from 2021 and there must be a decent bus service for them to take this opportunity to improve their access to education and employment.  

It’s time for Dumfries and Galloway Council to exercise the hard won right to bring bus services back into public ownership and to stop providing profit opportunities for private companies at taxpayers’ expense”. 

Please take action now to Haud the Bus and demand Better Buses! Sign up to our campaign and write to your local Councillor to let them know how important buses are to everyone.