Members of the industry are again included on an Honours List, this time to mark the King’s birthday. Services to transport is a reliable regular among reasons for recognition. While not all those individuals from coach and bus that are nominated gain awards, it can generally be expected that the sector is represented on each list.
People like Bill Hiron, Sonya Byers, John Trayner, Mark Fowles, the multiple drivers of recent years and those many others from the industry to feature on Honours Lists past and present richly deserve their moments in the spotlight.
If a closer look is taken, it is noticeable that often their MBE, OBE or other title is not granted solely for the recipient’s contribution to transport. Services to skills, education, diversity, charity, community, safety and others are frequently tied to the transport aspect.
That demonstrates the closeness that the coach and bus industry has to other areas of society. No surprise to those working in it, but a valuable illustration for others of how the sector sits squarely alongside numerous areas of social importance.
Rarely do people travel by a coach or a bus for the sake of it. Usually, they do so for a cause. Employment, visits, appointments, education, tourism, pleasure. All are vital to the industry’s reason for existing, just as the industry is key to them.
The sector has done good work since 2020 to underline its relevance to those societal areas. Coach’s importance to the wider tourism landscape has been highlighted numerous times. The mode’s relevance to education is long established, and it is gaining traction in commuting. Bus’s contribution across the piste is undeniable.
While efforts to strengthen these cases continue and form part of advocacy work around the general election, is there a similar base-level understanding among politicians of how coach and bus sits with and supports so many facets of day-to-day life?
The answer for the previous government was no: Its handling of rail industry strikes illustrated a total lack of transport understanding. If the more politically visible rail sector could not make headway, road-based modes were never going to.
Labour might be expected to offer a more understanding ear. But its manifesto does not mention coach at any point and bus garners little better, bar another airing of existing policy. Little relevance of local public transport to big-ticket policies is noted. For a government in waiting that is betting the farm on growth and wealth generation, that is a big omission.
Sterling existing work from trade bodies notwithstanding, the industry will be in the position of largely making its political case afresh from 5 July. If it needs some help in doing so, those who decide the recipients of honours medals may be influential people to call upon.
