Meeting documents

Councillor Winn

Cabinet Member for Communities

To consider the attached report.

Contact Officer:  Elaine Hassall (01296) 585364

(a)          Decision(s)

That some of the current funding, to be determined as part of the budget setting process,  be retained in the budget for a time limited period for the purpose of providing pump priming funding (not revenue costs) for new or existing community transport schemes, the process and criteria to be decided upon the outcome of discussions with other partners.

(b)          Reason(s) for Decision(s)

To maintain if possible some form of community transport provision following the removal of the tokens scheme. 

(c)        Alternative Options Considered

To cease discretionary transport provision entirely.  However, Cabinet felt that it would be appropriate to explore other options, as referred to above.

(d)       Relevant Scrutiny Committee

Environment and Living.  That Committee has considered this issue and is of the view that the option now being proposed by Cabinet would be the most appropriate but that if this proves unsuccessful, then the token scheme should be ceased.

(e)        Conflicts of Interest / Dispensation(s)

Councillor Irwin declared a personal interest in view of his association with a particular community transport scheme within the District.

In 2011, Bucks County Council replaced AVDC as the Travel Concession Authority (TCA).  That same year AVDC and the County Council entered into an agreement which allowed AVDC to operate a discretionary travel token scheme on the County’s behalf.  Research showed that AVDC was one of only a few local authorities that operated a concessionary travel arrangement.

The discretionary concessionary taxi token scheme was an alternative option for people who qualified for a free bus pass but could not make use of bus services.  There were currently 116 people registered onto the scheme for 2018.  The scheme was fully funded by AVDC with a budget of £33,400 per annum.  The tokens were sourced from an external specialist company.  Qualifying individuals were able to apply for up to £90 worth of tokens per annum which they could spend with a participating taxi firm for essential journeys.  The tokens could be used to fully or partly fund a journeys up to the cost of £15.  The taxi firm then had to exchange the tokens for payment through the specialist company that had provided the tokens.

There had been a steep decline in the number of participating taxi operators involved in the scheme (from 21 in 2011 to 5 in 2017).  The primary reason was that the scheme had become financially unviable for them as the minimum value of the tokens they could exchange was £100 and the number of journeys being made was not high enough to make the scheme worthwhile from a business perspective.  This was an optional arrangement and taxi operators could choose not to participate.

For these reasons the operation of scheme had been reviewed as follows:-

·         Community transport schemes within the Vale had been mapped.

·         A survey of current users.

·         Consultation with the Transport Hub (run by Community Impact Bucks).

·         National research on older people and transport needs.

·         Conversations with community and statutory partners.

·         A general review of the scheme as currently operated.

·         Research of other options in other parts of the County.

·         Commissioning Community Impact Bucks to signpost existing users to alternative provision.

The results of this research were appended to the Cabinet report and could be viewed on the Council’s website.

Two options had been identified.  The first was to cease the current scheme altogether.  Discretionary transport provision was not a statutory District Council function.  To work with other partners to ascertain whether some form of alternative provision could be made, perhaps utilising pump priming funding using the current budgetary provision.  It might well be possible that the Local Area Forums might wish to become involved on a match funding basis.

The matter had been considered by the Environment and Living Scrutiny Committee which had expressed a preference for the second option, although the Committee had indicated that if this was not feasible then the current scheme should be ceased.

RESOLVED –

That some of the current funding, to be determined as part of the budget setting process, be retained for a time limited period for the purpose of providing pump priming funding (not revenue costs) for new or existing community transport schemes, with the process and criteria being decided upon the outcome of discusns with other partners.

NOTE: Councillor Irwin, who is involved with an existing community transport scheme declared a personal interest in the above item.