Services under spotlight
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• More than a dozen studies are being carried out into the deregulation of bus services, Transport Minister David Mitchell has told Members of Parliament.
Consultants are carrying out the studies for the Transport and Road Research Laboratory in Nottingham, the Medway towns, Blackburn, West Wiltshire, West Glamorgan and parts of Powys and Clwyd.
The TRRL is also doing re
search with the Passenger Transport Executive in Tyne and Wear, Greater Manchester, West Yorkshire, Merseyside, the West Midlands and Strathclyde.
Mitchell said similar studies were being financed by the Scottish office, with a contribution from the Department of Transport.
The advent, however, of full deregulation, has already prompted criticisms from a number of local authorities. Councillor Martin Doughty, chairman of Derbyshire's transport committee, says deregulation is a "total and unworkable failure. So far very few changes have been notified in Derbyshire. No new operators of any significance have come forward and more services are being cut back than introduced."
According to Michael Simmons, chairman of the transport committee of the Association of Metropolitan Authorities, "Preliminary evidence show that since deregulation people across the country have stopped travelling by bus because the system is simply too complicated."