§ Mr. BlizzardTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions if he will estimate the cost of a concessionary travel scheme that would allow pensioners to travel for half fare on all buses in the country. [155132]
§ Mr. HillWe have already guaranteed that from 1 June all pensioners (and disabled people) will receive at least half fare reductions on local buses, with a free pass. The cost of extending that to allow travel at half fare on buses anywhere in England is provisionally estimated at £25 million a year.
£million Nature of funding 1997–98 1998–99 1999–2000 2000–01 2001–021 Revenue Support Grant 2.577 2.272 2.149 1.969 2.363 Income from National non domestic Rates 3.304 3.339 3.644 4.089 4.073 Housing Investment Programme2 1.192 1.131 1.247 2.966 1.362 Housing Revenue Account Subsidy 0.72 0.13 0 40 N/A Capital Receipts Initiative 0.305 1.004 1.124 0 0 Cash Incentive Scheme 0 0.04 0 0 0 SRB Funding3 — — — 0.035 1.5 Transport Supplementary Grant 4.088 0.674 0.755 0 0 Transport Annual Capital Guideline 4.088 0.714 0.693 0 1.135 Transport Block Supplementary Credit Approval 0.871 0.925 1.326 4.562 11.289 Rural Bus Challenge Grant 5— 0.2486 0.2180 0.313388 — Rural Bus Subsidy Grant 5— 0.293252 0.579324 0.579324 0.739752 1Where known. 2Housing Investment Programme—between 1997–98 and 1999–2000 includes Annual Capital Guidelines, Private Sector Renewal Grant and Disabled Facilities Grant. From 2000 onwards, due to the single pot allocations are Annual Capital Guidelines and Disabled Facilities Grant. 3SRB funding covers deprived towns in West Sussex. This includes Selsey within Chichester district council area. 4Provisional figure. 5Grants not available.