CALLS for free bus travel for young people in Herefordshire have been dismissed – for now.

North Herefordshire Green MP Ellie Chowns, whose constituency includes Brampton Abbots, said: “Pensioners get free bus travel but children do not,” during a Commons debate on bus funding last week.

“Is it not time to extend concessionary bus travel to children?”

To which transport secretary Louise Haigh said the government is “considering whether it can extend a concession of some kind to young people”.

Herefordshire has recently received a £3,257,185 in bus support funding from the government on top of Bus Service Improvement Plan Plus, funding worth £950,000 confirmed in summer.

“The point of the Bus Improvement Plan funding is that it can be used to deliver concessionary schemes as well,” Ms Haigh said, and suggested Ms Chowns “should encourage her local authority to think about whether some of the revenue funding can be delivered for younger people”.

But Herefordshire Council has now poured cold water on the idea.

“As a large county with a very low population, we are not in receipt of the levels of funding that are received by many other areas,” its spokesperson said.

“Almost all of our money currently goes on protecting and supporting our core network services, which is the top priority in our Bus Service Improvement Plan.”

Bus passes for older people “is a national programme not a local one”, they pointed out.

“The funding we receive locally is far from sufficient to cover the costs required for a concessionary programme of travel for young people, and a national scheme would be necessary.”

But they said council hoped to take advantage of the national young people’s concession referred to by Ms Haigh, “when it appears”.

Ms Chowns later said: “I was recently contacted about a young person in my constituency who is worried she will not be able to continue her education post 16, as bus travel to the nearest college would cost £1,500 per year, and her family simply can’t afford to pay that.

“We do not have a postcode lottery for pensioners’ bus travel, so why should we for children and young people?”