SBC slammed for moneywasting

David O'Leary • Published 27 Aug 2010 09:30 0 Comments

COUNCIL bosses have been slammed following their take over of a local bus route.

Service 91 which runs between Biggar and Peebles and is largely used by school children was taken over by SBC following a recent retendering process.

During this process the local authority deemed all submitted bids to operate the route to be too expensive and decided to take it over themselves at a saving of £50,000.

The route had previously been operated by Munros and prior to that McEwans.

However parents and passengers have become angered at the slipshod and money wasting fashion by which SBC has begun running the service.

Last week ahead of pupils return to school after the summer break many Borders households at a cost of thousands of pounds received their child’s bus pass and info on new routes through their letterbox whereas previously passes were handed out in the pupils respective schools.

Many parents have also complained about receiving multiple passes.

Added to this the coach SBC assigned to the route is not fitted with the required ticketing equipment and drivers are therefore unable to charge passengers.

One parent said: “The council say they’ll save thousands by operating the route themselves and then spend thousands lettering half the households in the Borders.

“Any information they wished to include could have been handed out along with the passes. It’s just the usual SBC isn’t it wasting money hand over fist.”

Colin Douglas, Passenger Transport Manager at SBC, added: “The service had to be introduced at short notice and as soon as we have ticket equipment available, fares will be charged.

“We had to notify parents and pupils of travel arrangements before the beginning of the school term due to the significant changes to routes and operators following the tendering exercise. It therefore made sense to send bus passes out in the same envelope.

“In addition, one of our major bus operators was insistent that pupils have passes in order to help them manage the allocation of pupils to particular buses and avoid overcrowding issues.”

SBC were unable to confirm however the money spent sending passes to individual homes but a council spokesperson did say that the council recently changed its mail service supplier which would have resulted in a significant cost saving.

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This article appeared in Peeblesshire News 27 Aug 10

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