Why must I lose my travel lifeline?

8:07am Wednesday 24th September 2008

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THEY provide a transport lifeline for hundreds of elderly and disabled people.

But at end of this month a Hampshire council’s free travel token scheme will come to the end of the road.

‘I’m surprised and concerned that the tokens have been withdrawn’

Driver Bill Pepper

It has caused a storm of protest and there are fears that axing the tokens will make many prisoners in their own homes.

Council chiefs say the travel tokens have been overtaken by the introduction of the national bus pass for over-65s, which came into force in April.

Grandmother Doreen Tickle, who is 86 and disabled, relies on Eastleigh Borough Council’s travel tokens to get her from her home to hospital and surgery appointments.

She says that because of her disability she is unable to use public transport and relies on the Hamble Good Neighbours bus service – a voluntary organisation – which takes the travel tokens.

Mrs Tickle can claim £52 worth of free tokens, which can be used for taxis, buses and trains, but now she fears she will have to dig into her pension.

She said: “This has come as a bolt of the blue and I am disgusted that there has been no consultation. Until I saw the Daily Echo I was totally unaware that the travel tokens were no longer being issued after September.

“I am going to have to pay cash and it is a case of having to find it.”

She said that Eastleigh councillors should “hang their heads in shame” for scrapping the tokens and not standing up for the most vulnerable in society.

Bill Pepper is a volunteer with the Hamble Good Neighbours Scheme and is Mrs Tickle’s regular driver.

He said: “We not only drive them to hospital but we stay with them while they are waiting for the appointment.”

Mr Pepper has condemned scrapping the travel tokens and says it will hit many people who rely on them as a transport lifeline.

He said: “I am surprised and concerned that the tokens have been withdrawn because they are so beneficial for those in need, especially at a time when fuel prices and the council tax is rising year by year.”

Eastleigh Southern Parishes Older People’s Forum are spearheading a campaign to reinstate the travel tokens. A petition has already been launched and there will be a public meeting at the Hamble Club in Hamble Lane tomorrow, starting at 2pm.

The forum’s secretary Diane Andrewes said: “We will receive a progress report on our campaign and decide what further action is needed.”

She said: “So many people are going to miss out when their tokens are taken away.”

Defending the council’s decision to axe the tokens, Eastleigh Cabinet member for Transport Councillor David Airey said the increasing popularity of the national bus pass had led to a big decline in the number of applications for travel tokens.

He said: “The national bus pass has exceeded all expectations and since April 1 this year 89.5 per cent of applications for travel concessions has been for the bus pass and only 3.7 per cent opting for travel tokens.”

Eastleigh Council says that to ensure finance is targeted at areas where it is most needed it has to review its allocation of funds for these services. It says that it will continue to operate one of the most extensive travel schemes in Hampshire.