Leicestershire has received a fresh injection of funding for struggling bus services. Leicestershire County Council announced in June that it would be pausing a review into whether 26 bus routes it says are underused and not financially viable should be scrapped after receiving a pot of cash worth £1.79 million from the Government.

Now, the local authority has announced that funding has been extended for a second year with a further £1.79 million promised for the 2024/25 financial year. The county council has not yet finalised how that money will be spent, however it is intended by the Government to maintain and support bus services.

The first round of funding is currently being used to keep running existing services which are subsidised by the county council because they do not pay for themselves, the council's director of environment and transport, Ann Curruthers, told the LDRS. This includes the cost of the park and ride service which operates across city and county borders, in addition to the 26 services in the firing line.

The council is now looking at reviewing its overall transport strategy now there is more funding available. Ms Curruthers said part of this could be revising the framework which sets out how the council assesses whether to continue to support subsidised routes and possibly "widening" that out.

The review of the 26 bus routes will remain on hold until the overarching strategy has been revisited, she told the LDRS. However, the news came with a warning the council cannot indefinitely support services which are poor value for money and are currently costing the council.

"We have to be supporting services that give us the best value for the community," Ms Curruthers said. "The really poor value services that are carrying very few people and are costing us quite a lot are not the ones we want to be putting any of our funding, including this additional funding, into."

The council has warned repeatedly of its "dire" financial position. The most recent predictions put the funding gap for the next four years at over £100 million and the local authority has previously said the £1 million of savings must be found for bus services alone.

The extra money could also allow the council to pilot a new demand responsive transport service for areas where the buses have low use, Ms Curruthers continued. This would be a bookable service of smaller vehicles which "can be a much more effective way of providing a public transport option in a rural community" due to the lower population numbers, she added. If the funding stretches far enough, she hopes this could be a seven-day-a-week alternative to the currently underused services.

The new funding is "not a long term solution by any means", however, she warned. "Obviously, with bus services, you want to continue them for years and years," she said.

"But actually, we're only able to guarantee at the moment that funding for the next two years. So we've got to kind of look at it in that light. It's very welcome. However, it's still a short-term help."

Work will begin soon to nail down how next year's additional funding will be spent, the council said. Councillor Ozzy O'Shea, cabinet member for highways and transport, said: "We're very pleased to get a further £1.79M from the Government and we'll be working on our Passenger Transport Policy Strategy to reflect what the Government wants us to achieve with this money.

"It's our chance to shape the public transport offer across rural Leicestershire communities whilst ensuring we do not continue to pay for the low value services. 90 percent of our bus network is commercial so the buses we run need to offer value-for-money for the council and for taxpayers."