Buses Lord Bradshaw asked Her Majesty's Government: What steps they are taking to ensure the provision of suitable terminal equipment on buses and in the offices of bus companies, in order that smartcards can be used efficiently in connection with the concessionary fares scheme in England. [HL2144] Lord Bassam of Brighton We have no plans to require smart readers to be installed on all buses in England. In areas where there are no smart readers, the new concessionary bus passes can simply be shown to the bus drivers as they are now. We have provided a total grant of £31 million to fund the distribution of around 6 million smartcard concessionary passes for April this year. We are also looking at what else can be done to incentivise both bus operators and local authorities to speed up the rollout of full smart ticketing. Lord Bradshaw asked Her Majesty's Government: Whether any figures are yet available for the take-up rates of concessionary bus fares; and what is the forecast uptake in 2008–09. [HL2145] Lord Bassam of Brighton Take-up rates of concessionary travel passes for those aged 60 and over in areas of England in each of the last five years is shown in the table below: ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | |Men and women aged 60 and over| | | | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | |Take-up rate (per cent) | | | | | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ | |2002 |2003|2004|2005|2006| ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |1 London Boroughs |78 |80 |83 |84 |85 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |2 Metropolitan built-up areas |65 |73 |71 |68 |79 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |3 Other urban areas over 250,000 population|54 |55 |57 |52 |61 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |4 Urban areas over 25,000 to 250,000 |45 |48 |47 |49 |53 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |5 Urban areas over 10,000 to 25,000 |46 |45 |46 |47 |53 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |6 Urban areas over 3,000 to 10,000 |46 |39 |40 |41 |51 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |7 Rural areas |28 |27 |33 |32 |44 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ |All areas |51 |53 |54 |53 |60 | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Local authorities are responsible for forecasting likely future take-up in their area based on local knowledge. In estimating the likely cost impact of the new concession an assumption of 85 per cent pass take-up across England was used. We currently expect authorities outside London to issue around 6 million passes for the new concession.