Battle is launched over plans to cut free travel for pensioners
A campaign is being launched against 'terrible' plans to strip pensioners of free train and tram travel and cut funding for Ring and Ride services. The proposal is part of a £14 million package of cuts revealed by Centro.
The organisation, funded by councils in the West Midlands, says it has to slash the budgets for 'discretionary' travel. Under its cost-cutting plans, fares for children on buses would rise from half an adult fee to two thirds while funding for the Ring and Ride service would be reduced.
The authority said it also had the option of scrapping funding for children's bus fares and Ring and Ride, which provides a door-to-door service for older people, altogether.
Free bus travel for pensioners and the disabled will be protected because it is required by law. But Centro had previously gone further by extending it to trams and trains using its own budgets.
- Axe threat to free West Midlands travel for elderly in Centro cuts
Walsall councillor and former mayor Richard Worrall, who has previously led calls for the National Pensioners' Convention for free bus travel for senior citizens, today revealed he would campaign for Centro to have a rethink.
He said: "If there is a 25 to 30 per cent cut to funding for Ring and Ride then there's not going to be a lot left.
"The service is staring oblivion in the face so I am organising a campaign to limit the damage done to this and other services and to persuade the leaders that although they have to make cuts, of all the services Centro has we have got to limit the damage to accessible transport for elderly and frail people.
"I am very angry at the cuts being imposed by the Government. It is absolutely terrible."
Councillor Worrall will be starting a petition and organising events to promote his campaign. He added he believed few savings would actually be made by axing free tram and train travel for pensioners – and warned that Ring and Ride could struggle to survive if grants are slashed.
He said: "This is just appalling and I am very angry at what is being done. I don't blame the leaders of the authorities but we need to make sure that the choices they make are the least damaging to the most vulnerable people."