VOLUNTEERS running the Tavistock Country Bus are appealing to Tavistock’s MP Geoffrey Cox to help them fight off a threat from Government which could see them having to fold.

The service which helps housebound and elderly people is among community transport schemes across the country facing having to shoulder the same costs as commercial bus companies after current UK guidance was challenged in the European courts.

The timetabled service, which operates one 16-seater minibus with nine volunteer drivers, provides vital transport to allow elderly, disabled and housebound people to come into Tavistock to do their shopping and meet friends. They also run trips out on Saturdays.

However, because a fare is charged for their service, they are being caught by a European Union ruling that not-for-profit organisations which charge a fare should bear the same costs as a commercial operator.

Tavistock Country Bus secretary Peter Walshe and chairman Derek de Glanville are meeting Mr Cox on Saturday, June 9 to ask him to intervene on their behalf. They say that the extra costs proposed would shut them down.

The Department for Transport is currently consulting on proposals, which among other things would mean all the volunteer drivers have to get a Public Service Vehicle (PSV) operator licence, at a cost of around £1,700 for the licence alone, on top of regular training costs.

Mr Walshe said: ‘None of the drivers we have now would want to take the PSV licence, which means we would lose our drivers. We are also being expected to take on a transport manager which is absolutely ludicrous. We only have one minibus.’

The organisation offers a door-to-door service for people with mobility problems, in a minibus that can accommodate wheelchairs. Like the two ring and ride services in Tavistock and Okehampton, also affected by these changes, they say that their service is not in competition with local commercial operators.

‘Commercial operators wouldn’t touch what we do, it is uneconomic. It would be too much hassle with them to pick up one person outside their house in a particular location,’ said Mr Walshe. ‘We’ve set up and we operate community transport as a way of making up for what commercial operators don’t do.’

In a letter to Mr Cox, the trustees pointed out that the organisation brings about £110,000 into the Tavistock economy simply by bringing people into town to do their shopping. In 2017 alone, it carried 8,300 passengers.

‘Our bus service is vital for many elderly and isolated people and it is highly likely that under the proposed changes to the regulations, we will have to cease operating our bus routes and stop the transport services we have been providing for over 37 years,’ they wrote. ‘Nearly all the routes we run, are of no interest to commercial bus operators, due mainly to having too few passengers and the roads being too narrow for long buses to manoeuvre.’

Also being affected by the changes is the not-for-profit Tamar Valley Community Buses Association, which runs the Tamar Valley Community Bus over the Tamar, which services people living in Calstock and surrounding hamlets and villages.

They have one minibus, driven by volunteer drivers, providing a door-to-door service for frail and disabled people.

Association chairman David Harding said: ‘It would just be too expensive for our drivers to have to get PSV licences. We just couldn’t afford to do it.’