England's New £2 Bus Fare Cap: Commuter Savings and Concerns

For Sarah Bodger the cost of travelling to work is "crippling".

The wool shop owner says she travels about four hours from Bedworth in Warwickshire to Leamington Spa and back, six days a week.

The journey also involves catching two buses each way.

Sarah says she endures the long travel time as she loves running her shop. "It makes me happy," she says.

But the cost of getting there comes to £58 per week, or more than £3,000 per year, she says.

That will change when a newly-announced cap on most single bus fares comes into force in England in January, which Sarah says will enable her to save £500 a year.

After announcing the scheme, Prime Minister Andy Burnham said no-one should be "priced out" or "left behind" when it comes to affordable transport links.

"It's going to make a huge difference to me," Sarah tells the BBC.

But what do others think of the new announcement?

Like Sarah, another who thinks it will improve his quality of life is Charlie in Bristol.

The 24-year-old, who lives on the city's outskirts, said capping bus fares would mean he'd be more likely to travel into the city centre on weekends.

However Holly Haines, who lives in a rural part of Hereford near the England-Wales border, said the cap would have no impact on her bus travel as the service she uses is provided by a Welsh company.

She said that despite the current £3 bus cap in England, a single on her bus costs at least £4.20, despite the journey being "entirely in England".

"Whilst I would love for other people to benefit from the £2 capped fare... I find it hard that I will not be able to benefit from it," she said.

Diane Wordsworth, who also lives in a rural part of England, thinks that while the £2 cap is a good idea, bus services need to be improved first.

"We're in a semi-rural part of Doncaster," she said, "but even when we've lived in more built-up areas, the buses in town... stop at 9pm, so you can't get back from anywhere and, therefore, have to take a car and designate a driver, or pay for a taxi."

"We need a proper bus service first, that isn't run by several different companies.

"Then we might be able to take advantage of capped fares and use public transport more."

Seb Pelisse, meanwhile, said while the bus fare cap would be positive news for those who don't drive, it would make little difference to his own finances.

The 33 year old, who lives in Surrey, told BBC Your Voice that he uses his car to get around where he lives, and commutes on the train to London for work.

He said the bus fare cap is "a great measure for anyone not driving", but added that fixing the train fares would "help many more".

"Working in London I would expect the price of the train to go down because the commute is horrendously expensive nowadays," he said.

The new cap will take effect from 1 January 2027 for fares on participating buses outside of London.

The scheme is expected to cost more than £500m, which Burnham said would be paid for by "reprioritising" government funds.

But Shadow Chancellor Mel Stride said the government had not actually specified where the money would come from.

In its announcement, the government said £454 million will be reallocated from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESN). DESN said this will be used in addition to funds already earmarked by the Department for Transport for buses.

In January 2025, an England-wide bus fare cap rose to £3 under Sir Keir Starmer's Labour government, although Liverpool and Manchester are examples of city regions where fares have been held at £2.

While a lower fare cap is welcome, the Campaign for Better Transport said rural areas were still suffering from fewer bus routes and services, adding that such areas had been more affected by council cut backs in the last decade than urban zones.