Bucks rejects bid from independents' group
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BUCKINGHAMSHIRE County Council has rejected a consortium of independent bus operators bid to take over Milton Keynes' bus services and has awarded the hulk of its supported services to the National Bus Company instead.
Promoter of the independent group, consultant Dr Martin Isles, has accused the county council of acting to preserve the status quo and stifling initiative and innovation at the ratepayers' expense in rejecting the consortium tender which, he alleges, was 300,000 cheaper than that of Milton Keynes City Bus, the NBC subsidiary.
'Hie Council detailed several reasons for rejecting the hid.
The initial tender was in Dr Isles' name — he is not an operator and this was not acceptable.
It also had misgivings about sonic of the vehicles the independents planned to use on certain services. They would have been high-floor bus grant coaches.
Buckinghamshire considered that the bid in the name of Armstrong Coaches was the only one of the consortium based in Milton Keynes.
The service, a four-bus cross-city service currently financially self-supporting, has been awarded to this operator.
Council officers looked at the bid in relation to the size of Armstrong Coaches and its facilities and its ability to provide reliable services.
They were concerned that some members of the consortium were based over 15 miles away from Milton Keynes and that the bid proposed that each operator would be responsible for its own working and there would, therefore, be unac ceptable delays in recovery after breakdowns.
The Council offers also found some proposed schedules from the consortium did not allow sufficient recovery time in periods of heavy loadings or had weather.
This compounded their doubts about whether a reliable and safe service could be maintained.
The officers also considered that they had a duty not to award a contract that would threaten the survival of MK Citybus — which relies on local bus operation for 95 per cent of its business — under the clause of the Act that requires them not to inhibit competition.
They also point out that the consortium had the option to register other services it wished to opeate without support under the terms of the Transport Act.