South Scotland MSP Colin Smyth has demanded answers from the Scottish Government on what it is doing to reverse the huge decline in bus services in Dumfries and Galloway.

Speaking in the Scottish Parliament last week, the local MSP asked Minister for Connectivity Jim Fairlie what action the Government can take to support the reversal of the reported reduction of bus services in Dumfries and Galloway.

The Parliamentary question follows a recent consultant’s report for South West of Scotland Transport Partnership (SWESTRANs) which suggests that rising costs and falling passenger numbers means even more routes may need to scrapped and replaced by community transport operators as well as an expanded council service.

In 2019 Colin Smyth was successful in amending the Transport Act going through the Scottish Parliament to lift the ban on councils setting up publicly owned bus firms to run services direct. He now wants the Government to provide funding for councils such as Dumfries and Galloway to use the powers to run their own bus service to prevent further cuts.

Colin Smyth continued: “Services across the region have been in decline for more than a decade, and so have local government budgets.

“An independent report that went to this month’s meeting of the South West of Scotland Transport Partnership warned that the situation is going to get worse.

“A summary of the report notes that “the fragile position of the bus industry in Dumfries and Galloway is acute … Resilience is at a historic low and the risk of further degradation is significant” and that “any withdrawal of service … capacity would have a major impact.”

“Does the minister accept that the current model of bus service delivery in rural regions such as Dumfries and Galloway is absolutely broken and that we need a significant increase in the provision of publicly owned and publicly run services in the region before we lose even more services?”

Speaking after the session Colin Smyth added: “Bus services in rural areas are essential but they are struggling.

“Public transport is a public service and in my view, like all public services, should be publicly owned and run.

“Councils now have the powers to run their own bus services as a result of amendments I made to the Transport Act. The blockage is the Scottish Government who haven’t yet provided any funding for councils to do so.

“They need to understand the crisis our bus network faces, make funding available and allow councils to run buses direct or set up arms-length publicly owned bus firms so that we can have services that put passengers, not profits first.”