Ye cannae shove yer granny off a franchised bus

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Ye cannae shove yer granny off a franchised bus

Hours after his speech, Scotland’s first minister was being compared to a brutal African dictator. Two dictators, in fact. What horrifying plans had John Swinney announced to warrant this verdict? Bus reform. 

The stinging critique — hyperbole, even — came from Sandy Easdale, one of two brothers who own and run McGill’s Buses. So incensed was he by the prospect of franchising one of our most important public transport networks that he compared Swinney to the dictators Idi Amin and Robert Mugabe. 

Disdain from the bus companies notwithstanding, it was to rapturous applause that Swinney made his announcement during the SNP’s Aberdeen conference last weekend. He committed to bringing all of Scotland’s bus network “back into public control” through “franchising and regulation”. Not only that, Swinney wants this achieved by the end of this parliament in 2031. Five years to fundamentally change the way 334 million journeys are taken annually. Bold, John, bold.

Meanwhile on Clydeside, our local transport partnership, SPT, is already two and a half years into that very process. We’re the pilot, the test case, in Swinney’s largest specific policy announcement to date. No other part of Scotland has an equivalent to SPT, which runs the Subway, Buchanan bus station, and oversees much of the city's transport. Nor are any local councils actively pursuing franchising, where a regional authority divvies up bus routes into bundles, aka ‘franchises’, dictates ticket prices, then puts these franchises out to tender for private operators to bid for and run. Profit for the operators is built into the model. The routes are decided, in theory, based on what the public needs, rather than where companies can make the most money.

Franchising is distinct from municipal buses, like in Edinburgh, where the local authority actually owns and operates the vehicles. Right now, Glasgow’s bus system is fragmented, with FirstBus, McGill’s, Stagecoach, Ember, and 30 other smaller operators all running one route or another in the region. Generally, they choose their own routes which can lead to over-provision in places like the city centre, and transport deserts in places like Milton in north Glasgow. It can even lead to the absurd case of the number 38. 

Boarding the 38 on Renfield Street is like a lucky dip. It’ll take you from Johnstone to Glasgow if you’re on the McGill’s service, or from Carntyne in the east to the city centre if you’re with FirstBus. The same number is on the headsign but the routes are totally different. 

Within this private-led system, SPT contracts 12% of all network miles from private companies — things like night buses, school runs and inter-hospital hops — so they’re already doing some franchising. But to take that number from 12% to 100% in five years is a tall order. One which Sandy Easdale has vowed to fight with “every breath I’ve got and… every penny I've got”.

We're Robbie, Calum, and Beth, and we run The Bell. It's been going for two years now and we've been steadily expanding our reach and covering more of Glasgow, more in-depth. This campaign we're running is about ensuring quality local journalism is here to stay, and in return we'll work hard to make Glasgow a better place. We love doing this, and the campaign is a lot of fun (and graft). To share the love, you can choose your price for The Bell, with an annual option that saves you £40. And if you're not quite sure yet about committing, a generous £2.99 per month option as well.

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