Keep our bus passes free, say 150,000

The national Love the Bus Pass signature petition is led by Walsall Pensioners' Convention, whose members fear for the future of concessionary bus travel, currently available throughout England.

Organisers had hoped to secure 100,000 signatures but announced they have managed to surpass their original target.

A delegation from Walsall Pensioners' Convention will hand over the petition, packed inside 18 large folders, tomorrow.

They say their petition is the first phase in a grass-roots campaign aimed at keeping the pass as a statutory universal national entitlement free at the point of use for elderly and blind people.

Walsall-based campaigner Richard Worrall said: "The 150,000 plus signatures we'll be delivering to Number 10 are just the first instalment. We'll be back on the eve of next May's general election with the final instalment.

"The response to the petition campaign has been quite extraordinary – where else do you get 150,000 pen-on-paper signatures these days? It is testament to the widespread fear amongst millions of older and disabled people as to the future of their pass which, for many of them, is an absolutely essential lifeline."

The group also wrote to 750 local newspapers in England to help boost their campaign.

As a result, responses and signatures were returned mainly by post from well wishers from Bodmin to Burnley, Cargo to Cambridge, Southampton to Seahouses, Tyneside to Torpoint, and Worthing to Wirral.

Mr Worrall added: "It's also a clear demonstration of the power of the local press. Politicians need to sit up and take notice of this army bestirring itself, all 11 million of them with a vote, and all of them watching, along with families and friends, to see which parties pledge to keep the pass in its present form."

All the major parties pledged before the 2010 general election to keep the pass, but calls for the scheme to be reviewed soon followed in 2011.

The English National Concessionary Travel pass was introduced in 2008. The National Pensioners Convention, which backs the campaign, wants an undertaking from all the political parties that the pass will be kept.

The delegates will be accompanied to 10 Downing Street by Walsall North MP David Winnick.

He said: "I shall be accompanying Richard Worrall to Downing Street to present a petition to the Prime Minister strongly urging that the national bus pass is retained.

"The 'Love The Bus Pass' campaign has attracted considerable support throughout the country; there is no doubt that it is highly valued by those of pensionable age.

"If the bus pass was undermined in any way, including by means testing, it would be a heavy blow to pensioners, and certainly mean that a large number who are now able to travel would find it that much more difficult for obvious financial reasons.

"My support for such a facility as the bus pass goes back to the 1960s."