The start of procurement for bus franchising in Wales may be “marginally” delayed, the Chief Executive of Transport for Wales (TfW) has admitted.
The South West is due to be the first region of Wales to introduce franchised services, with the timeline stating 2027.
However, TfW CEO James Price told the Climate Change, Environment, and Infrastructure Committee in the Senedd today that preparation of secondary legislation may lead to a setback.
The Bus Services (Wales) Bill was passed on 10 December 2025 but is yet to gain Royal Assent.
Mr Price believes that secondary legislation will not be passed until after the Senedd Election in May “because of the detail that is necessary to do it right”.
He adds: “I think that will mean that the procurement that we start in South West Wales might start marginally later than we had said but that the overall programme for franchising will still hit the same milestones that we have said.”
The schedule for the remaining areas would see bus franchising reach North Wales in 2028, South East Wales in 2029 and Mid Wales in 2030.
Mr Price also revealed that TfW had recently appointed a bus professional with commercial experience to help his team and who was due to start in February.
Talking of the need to hire a “senior operational bus person who has run one of the big bus companies”, he said the as-yet-unnamed individual would be charged with “driving sensible bus and commercial behaviour within the organisation”.
He also cast doubt on previous assessments of the financial impact of the project, saying: “I don’t believe that it will cost anything like that to run franchising”, although admitting it will be a challenge to do it within the available resources.
