Latest editorial
STUC report exposes cost of privatised buses
People board a bus in the rain in Glasgow, December 12, 2023
“At local level, it’s different."
TRANSPORT unions and campaigners called for a publicly owned, integrated transport system at a packed fringe meeting today.
The Scottish TUC’s The Next Stop: The Case for Publicly Owned Buses in Scotland report noted that public subsidies have risen since the pandemic — amounting to £439 million, or 58 per cent of all Scottish bus operators’ revenue, in 2023-24 — while the number and frequency of services has continued to decline.
“Using private operators to operate public services doesn’t work and is a recipe for disaster, as we can see from passenger services’ decline year on year,” Dougie Maguire of Unite told the meeting.
More from this author
Ben Chacko asks NIZAR TRABULSI of the now banned Syrian Communist Party (Unified) to explain the country's turbulent, and violent, post-Assad scene
From renewable tech to alternatives to the dollar, BEN CHACKO was encouraged by an optimistic meeting held by the China Media Group this week
