July 21 2025
Rebecka Steven, Senior Policy Adviser at the CPT, explains the rules and funding around concessionary fares for bus passengers.
Catching the bus is a daily habit for many people over the age of 60 – but eligibility for free bus travel is a varied, and often poorly understood, picture nationwide.
In London, Scotland and Wales, bus travel is free from the age of 60. Across the rest of England, people become eligible for concessionary travel when they reach state pension age – which is presently 66.
In the English regions, concessionary travel is funded through a scheme called the English National Concessionary Travel Scheme (ENCTS) which covers free bus journeys for certain categories of disabled people as well as for those of pension age.
Local governments administer the scheme, receiving about £700 million a year for it from the Department for Transport – although this sum doesn’t cover the full cost, which was £877 million last year, so the gap needs to be filled by council funding.
Free, or subsidised travel for older people helps people access opportunities and activities that might otherwise be out of reach – and there’s lots of evidence to show that it boosts health and wellbeing. A study by UCL found that bus pass holders are 37% less likely to be sedentary and a third less likely to be classed as socially isolated.
And concessionary travel is important, in particular, in maintaining bus routes in rural areas, where the population tends to be older.
ENCTS is a popular scheme – in the year to March 2023, there were 567 million concessionary bus journeys taken by 8.7 million people with eligible bus passes. Of these pass holders, nine out of ten are older passengers, and 10% are disabled people. But the number of concessionary journeys is still lower than it was before the COVID-19 pandemic – reflecting what seems to be a permanent change in overall travel habits among older people.
Under ENCTS, bus operators are reimbursed by councils for the cost of journeys taken by pass holders. An important principle for the industry is that bus companies should be no better or worse off as a result of concessionary travel schemes – so the amount bus companies get is adjusted for journeys ‘generated’ by free bus passes, as well as for revenue lost through journeys that would have been taken if passengers had paid fares.
Across much of the country, concessionary passes can’t be used during the morning rush hour and are only valid for journeys taken from 9.30am onwards. But local authorities, if they choose, can fund extensions to the concessionary travel – including extending hours, making travel available to companions of disabled passengers or to other age groups – such as young people under 16.
Free travel for older people is an important part of Britain’s public transport provision. But different rules in different parts of the country from time to time attract comment.
More than 100,000 people have signed a petition on the UK parliament website calling on the Government to extend free bus travel to everybody over the age of 60. Others, though, argue that a higher priority should be cheaper fares for younger people at the start of working life.
It is up to politicians to set the rules. Bus operators themselves are keen to ensure that whatever its scope, concessionary travel is properly funded and reimbursed.
The Confederation of Passenger Transport’s priority is to work with Government and with local authorities on making concessionary travel work as effectively as possible – to keep administrative costs low, to deliver reliable, comfortable journeys and to help ensure that every penny of public money delivers a return on investment.