The coach and bus industry has a lot riding on politicians in 2024. Rishi Sunak’s decision to call a general election for 4 July is thus a fly in the ointment for how some significant pieces of work and policy may otherwise have been hoped to proceed across the rest of the year.
In the assumption that Labour forms the next government, the overarching trajectory for bus in England is already known. It involves more public control. However, the party is – at the time of writing – still to publish its manifesto.
What Labour’s approach to other matters that while not primarily concerned with buses will certainly impact them is unclear as a result. Will it look to road pricing? What will its position be on net-zero and air quality? Will it take steps to deal with congestion? And above all, how will it approach the growing imperative of long-term funding for the sector?
For coach, the key area that needs clarity – and urgent clarity at that – is PSVAR. The next stage of the review of those Regulations is already heavily delayed. Further lag will likely now accumulate to the extent that publication of future steps falls into 2025. That sits against a medium-term exemption approach that, in theory, has a fixed backstop in 2026.
The need for work on the Accessible Information Regulations is also clear. Equally so is that an exemption or extension for in-scope rail replacement services will be necessary from October. One organiser of those services has warned that availability of vehicles for rail replacement from then will be vastly reduced if dispensation is not forthcoming.
Worries about the Schengen area Entry/Exit System (EES) and how it will impact coaches at Dover are also clear and present, and will have been heightened by events at the port over the recent bank holiday weekend. EES, too, has an expected October commencement date.
Such is the level of desperation, Dover expects to reclaim land from the sea to create additional space to handle checks. What a new government will be able to do to about EES plans at such a late stage is unclear, but support to ensure that sufficient infrastructure is in place, and has been tested, is vital.
Policy work is undertaken by permanent Department for Transport staff, and that will no doubt continue during the election period. But enacting change requires ministerial sign-off. The question of summer Parliamentary recess also hangs in the air. For the industry, and coaching in particular, 2024 may not deliver what had been hoped for on the political front.
