The Westminster Desk | Brief

Alongside VAT coming off electricity, Andy Burnham's opening cost-of-living package includes the return of the £2 bus fare cap for most of England. The scheme rules and start date have not yet been published. Here is what going back to £2 is worth, and what it does to the promise ledger.

What returning to £2 saves

Single bus fares in England are currently capped at £3, after the £2 cap that ran from January 2023 was raised in January 2025. Restoring £2 takes £1 off every capped single. For a five-day commuter making a return trip, that is £10 a week, roughly £43 a month, and about £520 a year, which would make it the biggest single household saving in the package so far, comfortably ahead of the £45 electricity VAT cut. Lower-frequency riders save proportionally less; the cap applies per single fare, not per journey with changes, unless the scheme rules say otherwise when published.

The small print that is not written yet

"Most of England" is doing work in the announcement. London sets its own fares, and Greater Manchester's Bee Network already caps singles at £2, which means the new Prime Minister is, in effect, extending his own bus policy to the country. What is not yet published: the start date, which operators are in, and how long the cap is funded. The desk will update when the scheme rules appear.

The ledger moves again

This is the third promise from the Downing Street steps to acquire a number inside a week: £340 million against rough sleeping within hours, VAT off electricity on day two, and now the bus cap. The desk's promise ledger re-scores to three of five promises carrying numbers, with "power out of London" and "life's essentials back under public control" still consisting entirely of words. The full ledger update publishes Friday.

What to watch: the scheme rules, the start date, and the funding horizon. A cap that expires in a year is a discount; a cap that survives a spending review is a policy.