Go-Ahead Group chief executive David Brown urges audience of young bus managers to use the bus strategy as an opportunity for positive change

 
David Brown will retire as Go-Ahead Group chief executive at the end of this year after more than 10 years in the role

 
Go-Ahead Group boss David Brown has urged young bus managers to embrace the opportunity presented by the National Bus Strategy for England.

In the final installment of the Young Bus Managers Network’s online ‘Lunchtime Sessions’, Brown gave a far more upbeat presentation than the one given the previous week by bus entrepreneur Julian Peddle. Peddle had branded the bus strategy, Bus Back Better, which is championed by the prime minister, “Boris in Wonderland”.

Summarising his own personal thoughts on the strategy, Peddle said: “I’d love to be more positive about Bus Back Better but there are so many flaws in it that I fear it will lead to number of disjointed initiatives and will achieve little … I’m afraid it will all end in tears from what I see at the moment.”

Brown, who will retire as group chief executive at the end of this year after more than 10 years in charge at Go-Ahead, offered the perspective of one of the major bus groups that lobbied the government for a bus strategy.

“I recognise all the difficulties,” he said. “I could hear what Julian Peddle said the other week, I hear all that … But this is an opportunity for us to show local authorities that we know what we are talking about and we know what they need to do to actually make a difference for growing bus passenger numbers.”

Peddle had complained that the bus strategy’s requirement for every part of England to introduce Enhanced Partnerships from April 2022 was a way of “controlling the industry without paying for it”. However, despite the strings attached, Brown believes that Enhanced Partnerships are a price worth paying to achieve a breakthrough – especially with the huge challenge of winning back passengers lost during Covid.

“We started in 2018 talking about a bus strategy in a completely different world,” he explained. “I think it’s more important now than it ever was before.

If the price to pay was Enhanced Partnerships I’d put my hand up, because we are not going to get those numbers back without help. We cannot on our own grow those numbers back

“If the price to pay was Enhanced Partnerships I’d put my hand up, because we are not going to get those numbers back without help. We cannot on our own grow those numbers back. People will have changed their customer pattern. People will not want to come back on buses because they will still be concerned.

“We need government to change the messaging. We need government money on the infrastructure, and local authorities to be held to account for delivering a lot of these things. And if that’s what Enhanced Partnerships will give us then I’ve got both hands up – and we’ve got to be in there trying to get the maximum amount that we can get out of it.”

Brown spoke about some of his own fears about the strategy: “I’m worried about the politicisation of that money, whether it goes to the ‘red wall’ constituencies. I am worried about the speed of decision making. I’m worried about us doing our bit first and then waiting for the next bit to come. I worry about what I’ve always called ‘the greengrocer on the corner of the road’ objecting for not being able to park his greengrocer van outside [because of new bus priority measures].

This is what we’ve got to work with, this is what we’ve got to influence and this is where we show our mettle

“We will have to work our way through all of those things but at the end of the day it is the only show in town. There is no other show. This is what we’ve got to work with, this is what we’ve got to influence and this is where we show our mettle and show that we’re good at running buses and we know how to do these things.”

Brown offered his audience of young bus managers a wide range of strong arguments that can be made to persuade local authorities to support buses and he urged them to rehearse them.

“Don’t just stick to one thing,” he said. “Think about health, think about social care, think about air quality, think about congestion, think about all those other things that will influence people to get on your side in the battle for making sure that we get more priority for buses, and actually bus numbers will grow and we do all the good things that we’re going to need to do. So embrace it, be collegiate, be positive. It’s all looking good.”

 
Boris was the ‘catalyst’

As a senior figure who has lobbied government on behalf of the industry, Brown was able to provide insights into how the bus strategy came about and where it might go. He was also able to offer insights into the prime minister’s thinking, having worked as Transport for London’s surface transport MD for part of Johnson’s tenure as the city’s mayor.

Brown recalled the industry’s efforts to get the government to create a national bus strategy to kickstart growth: “I’ve got to be honest, the catalyst was really Boris Johnson coming in [as PM in July 2019]. He’d seen what I had done, what Peter Hendy had done [as TfL’s commissioner], what we had guided in, in terms of the buses in London … But in the end the bus strategy has come through Boris being an advocate of buses.

He’s all big picture stuff. In the end you’re going to say ‘what about the detail?’ … But you need friends

“He’s all big picture stuff. In the end you’re going to say ‘what about the detail?’ … But you need friends, you need friends who are going to actually say ‘I made a promise of 4,000 buses that are going to be zero emission’ and we need to keep him to that and keep reminding him of that.”

Brown said that his own experience of working with Johnson made him hopeful that he would honour the bus strategy’s commitments: “I remember when I worked him at Transport for London and 80% of his manifesto commitments I had to deliver. We got to one point where I said, ‘You really want to do this? Because it’s a complete and utter nonsense. We shouldn’t be doing it’. And he said, ‘No, I’ve made a commitment. We are going to do it’.

“So I’m hoping that that same thing will follow. He’s made a commitment to 4,000 [zero emission] buses, he’s going to make sure that actually happens and be on our side in battles with the Treasury.”

Brown said that Bus Back Better, which was published in March 2021, represents an endorsement of buses “from the highest levels in government”. “We should be really pleased that we’ve actually managed to get that,” he said. “This isn’t something that’s happened low down. The words were written by Andrew Gilligan, who is the advisor to Boris Johnson on transport. I know they were written by him. There’s no dubiety about that. I have accused him of being too London-centric in those words and he is, because that’s the only bit he knows. But he is incredibly knowledgeable, incredibly passionate about buses and we should capture that for all it’s worth.”

 
‘They are in a hurry’

A common observation about the bus strategy is the short timeframe it sets for delivery; local authorities are required to submit detailed Bus Service Improvement Plans (BSIPs) by October 2021 and implement Enhanced Partnerships by April 2022. When she spoke at the first of the Young Bus Managers Network ‘Lunchtime Sessions’ last month, transport minister Baroness Vere was unapologetic about this. “You have to have an ambitious timetable because actually time is running out,” she said. “We don’t want further decline in buses. None of us wants that. And I think that the timetable is achievable.”

When I spoke to Andy Gilligan he was very clear that part of this was holding the feet to the fire of the civil servants

Brown believes that the demanding timetable is a “clear management tactic”. “There’s a lot we need to deliver in a short space of time,” he said. “When I spoke to Andy Gilligan he was very clear that part of this was holding the feet to the fire of the civil servants. He knows these are really sharp deadlines for BSIPs and for starting Enhanced Partnerships, but they’re in a hurry, they are always in a hurry and if they didn’t have harsh deadlines they think it would all start drifting. So it’s a fairly clear management tactic they are actually trying to do.”

 
£17bn needed for e-buses

The government plans to set a date for ending the sale of new diesel buses in the UK. (New cars and vans must all be zero emission from 2035.) Governments have provided funding to bridge the gap between traditional diesel vehicles and their zero emission equivalents and £170m has been made available for buses in England (via the £120m Zero Emission Bus Regional Area scheme and the £50m All-Electric Bus City initiative). However, Brown said that Go-Ahead had crunched the numbers and he was now “going around government and explaining to them very gently that it’s quite a large cost to get to zero emission by 2035”.

The industry needs £17bn over the next 14 years to 2035 to convert the fleet to electric vehicles. That means there’s £552m required every single year

He explained: “If we extrapolate the numbers that we think for Go-Ahead, with the assumptions that we’ve made, and put across the whole of the industry, the industry needs £17bn over the next 14 years to 2035 to convert the fleet to electric vehicles. That means there’s £552m required every single year for the next 14 years. So the £170m that is out there at the moment is not enough and that’s the message.

“There is no answer to that. It just shows you that people will talk up the good fight without actually having a plan to deliver it. The answer you will get back if you say that to people in government is ‘yeah but you’ll get more people on your buses so that will pay for that’, and the answer I say is that ‘you can’t get people on your buses unless you put bus lanes in’ [alongside other measures].”

 
‘We need to make profits’

Brown said that profit should not be a dirty word in the bus sector.

“Unless you make profits you cannot invest,” he argued. “The money doesn’t come from anywhere else. The money to invest in new shiny vehicles, and all the other things you’ll need, only come from profits. And we have a real uphill battle of trying to to explain to people that profit is not a dirty word, because it isn’t – that’s where the cap ex spend comes from … I tell you, at the most senior level in the Department [for Transport] they don’t quite get this. Until we start making profits there isn’t a single low emission EV bus that’s going to be bought, because we can’t do it … So we need to get back to making profits. If it’s not us making profits the money is coming from the taxpayer.”

 
‘It’s our job to lead them’

The new Enhanced Partnerships will curb the commercial freedoms that bus operators have enjoyed since deregulation in the 1980s, compelling them to work more closely with, and depend on, local authorities. However, Brown does not believe that this is cause for concern.

“Yes there will be huge variability between each and every local authority,” he said. “It’s our job to influence them. It’s our job to lead them, it’s our job to take them by the hand and show them what is the art of the possible. A lot of them have no idea at all and we need to actually guide them in terms of our experience. And this is the time to be in their offices, this is the time to be talking to local politicians, this is the time to be actually providing solutions and helping them work their way through it.

“And yes, some of this will end up in franchising. It’s not the bus strategy that’s going to create the bus franchising. Franchising was already going to happen in Manchester and that’s inevitable. Maybe West Yorkshire will go that way but I’m pretty confident that most local authorities will choose Enhanced Partnerships.”

Brown foresees that there will be problems and bureaucracy on the road ahead, and he fears that the extra £3bn of available funding for buses could end up being spread “very thinly”. But he welcomes the greater accountability for the actions that local authorities take in relation to bus services in the areas, including targets for journey times and passenger growth.

We need to make sure that we are playing to all our strengths, and we deliver what we say we are going to deliver and hold them to task to deliver what they are going to deliver

“We need to make sure that we are playing to all our strengths,” he said, “and we deliver what we say we are going to deliver and hold them to task to deliver what they are going to deliver.”

He pointed out that stopping people from doing “mad things” – like blocking buses from accessing urban centres or offering free car parking – was “just as important as getting them to do a good thing”.

 
Franchising is ‘about power’

Julian Peddle had argued last month that Greater Manchester mayor Andy Burnham’s plans to franchise buses were “not going to benefit the passenger”, and Brown agrees with him. Plans to pursue franchising did not deter Brown’s Go-Ahead from acquiring a bus business in the north of the conurbation in 2019, but he is concerned that Burnham’s plans fail to address the issues that suppress bus use.

The most disappointing thing is that it’s not going to franchising with the view that we are going to have a massive great focus on buses

He explained: “I am quite accepting that we are going to franchising. That’s fine, we will go to franchising. It doesn’t cause any problems, but the most disappointing thing is that it’s not going to franchising with the view that we are going to have a massive great focus on buses, access to city centres, bus lanes, all of those things that make a difference.

“The really sad part is they’re going to revert to all the bad practices of bus operators in two or three years time. They will put up the fares, they will cut the bus network, they will cut the bus network on high frequency routes which actually garner the most commercial benefits, they will keep all the silly routes going because they’ve got social needs … and there won’t be an actual improvement in the bus network. It’s about power, it’s about politics, that’s it.”

 
‘No car-led recovery’

Finally, at national level, Brown wants support from the government to encourage people back onto buses following the damaging ‘avoid public transport’ messages that accompanied periods of lockdown.

“We’ve got to get the messages across the you can’t have a car-based recovery coming out of the pandemic,” he said. “Already traffic is back to 100%. We are looking at 65% passenger numbers. Traffic in parts of London, traffic in other parts of the country, are above 100%.

Until government gets the messaging right we will never get a green-based recovery

“It’s a statement of the obvious, we need government help to do that. Until government gets the messaging right we will never get a green-based recovery. You cannot talk up decarbonisation, green recovery, air quality, and at the same time not look at what you need to do with buses. They have to go together.”

 
This article appears in the latest issue of Passenger Transport.

DON’T MISS OUT – GET YOUR COPY! – click here to subscribe!