RARELY do I agree with Boris Johnson, but his announcement of a £3billion boost to expand and enhance bus services across England made me concede he is not always entirely misguided. Putting aside the question of how often the PM has been seen taking the bus himself, he is making a welcome Tory U-turn, albeit 40 years too late.

Many are still smarting from Margaret Thatcher’s withering credo that anyone found on a bus after the age of 25 was a “failure”. Why she picked on buses rather than the vermin-infested tube or unreliable trains is unclear, but the label stuck. And while doubt has since been cast on whether she actually uttered these words, the sentiment certainly embodied the Conservative party’s outlook. Nor did the PM ever correct the misunderstanding, if the statement was not hers.

Why would she? During her tenure, many Tories wanted to erect a visible barrier between those who were successful, and the less exalted; between professionals and go-getting self-starters who could afford to drive to work or buy a railway season ticket, and the losers who had no option but to queue in the rain at the bus-stop.

We will always remember the children cauight up in Dunblane

Johnson is not the only politician to recognise that improving the transport network, and properly connecting rural areas, is a big but essential ask for our environmental and economic progress. Yet the headaches of infrastructure, scheduling and expense this will inevitably entail are by no means the biggest hurdle it faces.

In trying to coax more of us out of cars and onto buses, the most intractable problem is stigma. Thatcher’s “failure” tag worked, because as anyone who regularly waits for the bus to hove into sight knows, there are times you wish a chauffeur-driven limo would roll up and carry you home. During rush hour especially, it’s no fun waiting in line for a delayed service which, when it arrives, is too full for further passengers unless they can squeeze into the luggage rack. No wonder people prefer to sit in traffic jams in the bubble of their own car, rather than risk arriving frazzled at their destination.

Nowhere is the stigma of going by bus more pronounced than in America. City bus stations are no-go areas for anyone concerned about their social status. And yet, far from being a grim budget choice, US buses can be glamorous. My husband has never forgotten taking the Manhattan jitney to the Hamptons. It was an early morning start and as he boarded he was handed orange juice, coffee, croissant and a copy of the New York Times, all part of the ticket price. Meanwhile, on this side of the Atlantic, many inter-city and rural buses I’ve taken are equally comfortable, if less glitzy. There is also a feeling of privacy and comfort you can’t get by train. A sense of security too, with a driver nearby.

There needs to be a three-point turn in public attitudes to bus travel, and Johnson’s initiative represents a start. North of the border, Holyrood seems also to acknowledge that this is a vital element in combatting carbon emissions. It is not so long ago that, under Johann Lamont, Labour was demanding free bus passes for the over 60s be scrapped. How antediluvian that now sounds. Instead, the SNP intends to widen the concession to all those under 19, a sensible move that regrettably has been delayed by the pandemic.

In terms of changing attitudes, it cannot start soon enough. Seeing my seven-year-old step-granddaughter awaiting what is fondly known as “the Trinity taxi” in Edinburgh – the number 23 – is a glimpse of a better future. At the bus stop, she falls into easy conversation with those her parents’ age and older, discussing what’s going on in their street, and which neighbours they know. “Thank you driver,” she says, like an Edinburgh matron, as she alights.

“Give me a girl at an impressionable age, and she is mine for life,” said Miss Jean Brodie, in somewhat sinister fashion. By the same principle, give a young person a free bus pass until they are 19, and a good habit will be formed. In my schooldays, it was assumed that you would start driving lessons as soon as you reached 17, or had saved enough. Getting a licence was a rite of passage that separated kids from adults. Owning your first car was a declaration of independence, occasionally louder than you might have intended, depending on the state of the exhaust.

Decades later, it’s no surprise it is hard work to prise those of my vintage from the steering wheel. Free bus travel, at whatever age, is the first step in showing that it is possible to get by easily without a car. Already there seems to be a dawning awareness that there are other options, reflected in a decline in twenty-somethings learning to drive. For city residents, cars might one day come to be seen as a burden rather than a liberation. Even for those of us who live in the country, buses could significantly reduce car use if they were more frequent, and the network were wider and better linked. Nor do we need tour-sized vehicles for local journeys. Shuttle-buses would be sufficient, so long as the service was regular, frequent and dependable.

Free passes are an opening gambit in changing attitudes. With the May elections drawing close, however, parties of all stripes need to provide fresh ideas for improving public transport, with buses to the fore. If, for instance, these services were protected by statutory law, rather than left to the discretion of individual councils, that would be a massive statement of intent.

The perils of potholes

Those living in outlying areas dread the annual revising of timetables, when essential routes are often trimmed or axed as cash-strapped councils pare their budgets. Such uncertainty is no foundation on which to build a network that ought one day to reach every crannie. If our Holyrood lieges do not want their green policies to stall or run out of juice, they need to set the wheels of a travel revolution turning. Soon those concerned about the environment might be taking not to the barricades, but to the nearest bus stop.

Our columns are a platform for writers to express their opinions. They do not necessarily represent the views of the Herald.