Tackling transport poverty in times of austerity

Economic austerity has widened and deepened across the UK in recent months. The combined effects of Brexit, the COVID-19 pandemic recovery and escalating energy prices have been plunged ever more people into poverty and many households now face significant additional challenges with their cost of living expenditure.

Transport poverty has emerged as a new dimension of this current poverty crisis. Young people are reporting that they cannot afford to attend schools and colleges because of the cost of transport, older people have become increasing socially isolated due to cuts in community transport services, whilst people are unable to take up job offers because low wages do not sufficiently cover the cost of their transport to work.

But it’s not only about problems with affordability. Many public transport services across the Greater Manchester region do not provide people with reasonable levels of access to their required destinations or are insufficiently frequent, especially in the early mornings, evenings and at weekends. This means that many low-income households have to own a car to meet their everyday travel needs, even when this puts them into debt.

In response to this escalating situation, austerity specialist Professor Sarah Marie Hall and transport inequalities expert Professor Karen Lucas from the University of Manchester’s Department of Geography hosted two public policy events funded by the Economic and Social Research Council’s (ESRC) Festival of Social Science to raise awareness of the lived experiences of ‘Transport Poverty and Economic Austerity’.

Public Panel Discussion

The first public event, brought together a panel of local policy makers, civil society organisations and academic researchers. Opening statements from the panel set the stage for a frank open discussion about difficulties in accessing reliable and affordable public transport in Greater Manchester. It discussed the socio-economic consequences of rising travel costs for young and older people and low-income households. It highlighted the many challenges that people who rely on public transport services face and spotlighted the need for targeted policy reform. There was a call for decision makers to specifically recognise the needs of local communities in their policies and plans for Net Zero, Healthy Cities and Bus Reform.

Practitioner Workshop

The second event was a follow-up workshop to bring together poverty alliance organisations with transport planning professionals to identify some ‘quick wins’ for highlighting and addressing transport austerity across the Greater Manchester region and more locally within districts. The idea was to share existing knowledge and to try to facilitate joined up action between the different participant organisations. Ultimately, the longer term aim is to develop a mid- and long-term action plan for tackling transport austerity.

Attendees brainstormed four main themes: i) How to value schemes to show their social worth? ii) What are the real opportunities to meet people’s travel needs? Iii) Car dependency and economic stress and the need for alternative travel options? and iv) What are the best ways to work together?

We then discussed what actions could be taken immediately; in the interim; and long term that would make a difference to transport austerity and identified.

Transport Austerity Working Group

We agreed that the momentum generated across the two events should be continued by forming a ‘Transport Austerity Working Group’ (TAWG) to facilitate ongoing collaborations that would lead to follow-up action. A website and a Teams group has been generated to enable communication amongst members. This blog series will keep you informed about our progress, so please feel free to get involved.

The next event to discuss Transport and Austerity is being hosted on 26th January 2023 by the University’s Policy@Manchester team.

To join this event please contact sol.hallam@manchester.ac.uk.

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the panelists and workshop attendees for their participation and help to get the ball rolling. We’d also like to thank the Mechanics Institute for hosting the panel discussion in their historical premises, and to the ESRC-Festival of Social Sciences for making both events possible. Most of all, we are grateful to the members of the public who participated in these events and shared their experiences and perspectives.