Conservative leader challenges Labour mayor's proposed bus tax increase

A challenge to plans to treble the region’s annual bus tax was defeated at a Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority (CPCA) meeting today (Monday, 29th January).

Cllr Wayne Fitzgerald (Conservatives, West), former leader of Peterborough City Council (PCC), asked Mayor Nik Johnson, head of the CPCA, to reconsider his proposal to treble his portion of residents’ council tax bills.

Dr Johnson, a Labour politician, has asked that band D households are charged £36 this year, up from £12 last year and nothing the year before.

He has said that the £11m this tax will generate will go towards bus network improvements and fund struggling routes such as the 5 connecting Peterborough and Yaxley.

But Cllr Fitzgerald, who sits on the CPCA’s overview and scrutiny committee, said that Dr Johnson should ask central government for more before turning to taxpayers.

“Do you think you failed to get the government funding required which is why you’re now looking to local taxpayers to make up the shortfall for your shortcomings?” he asked the mayor at a committee meeting.

Dr Johnson said that he was “obviously disappointed” that the CPCA didn’t receive Bus Strategy Improvement Plan (BSIP) funding from the Department of Transport (DfT) when it was distributed in 2022 but that it has made other successful bids to the government.

“I don’t think it’s necessarily to do with the individual who’s currently the mayor of the Combined Authority why those decisions are made,” he added.

Cllr Fitzgerald called these comments “naive” when “you’re the captain; you’re steering the ship”.

“I know from the bus minister myself that the Combined Authority did not get bus service improvement funding because of a lack of ambition,” he said.

Cllr Martin Smart (Labour, King’s Hedges) said that “Conservative members complaining about a Conservative government failing to fund us seems somewhat ironic” while Cllr Cameron Holloway (Labour, Newnham) added that money from government would still be taxpayers’ money.

Dr Johnsaid has said his tax is "fair".

“We could have asked for more but there is a responsibility to recognise that there is a cost of living crisis, so I think the proposal that’s on the table is one that’s fair but also gives a good distribution for the whole of the area," he said.

Cllr Fitzgerald’s recommendation to ask the mayor to reconsider raising his precept was defeated in a vote with four in favour and eight against at the overview and scrutiny committee meeting.

It will be discussed again by the CPCA’s board on Wednesday, 31st January, after which it is expected come into effect in May.