Monday 29 July 2013

At The Nexus

The five Tyne and Wear local authorities are preparing to take over the bus services, not on a London-style basis as is being claimed, but on a much better basis than that, there being no Boris Johnson in Tyne and Wear.

Thus will be saved 455 bus routes, including all school services, together with Metro Gold Card and the Shields Ferry.

The bus companies are incredulous. "Do the people of Tyneside and Sunderland really want to be subsidising the buses, the Metro and the ferries for ever more?", they ask. As if the question were rhetorical. It is not.

Speaking of the Metro, it was the best performing in the country when it was directly municipal. Thanks to central government fiat, it is now run by Deutsche Bahn. In which the majority shareholder is the German federal government.

Meaning that the Metro is still in public ownership. It is just not in the ownership of the British public. Still less of the public in Tyne and Wear.

One thing at a time, though. One thing at a time.

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