I represent a constituency of contrast: some of the wealthiest wards in Wales, alongside some of the poorest super-output areas of deprivation. In one of my poorest wards, the medical centre decided to downgrade the surgery in Pentwyn, disinvesting from the local community, and so patients who are either ill themselves or have children who are ill are having to walk a couple of miles just to get to the doctor's—and they're not feeling well, or their child isn't. Some of them are so poor they don't even have any credit on their phones, so they definitely can't afford a taxi. So, the absence of a bus is unbelievably difficult for them.

It isn't just poor households, however, whose lives shrink when bus services are withdrawn. I can recall three years ago when Cyncoed lost the bus service down the west side of the Roath lake that you'll all be familiar with—the devastating impact on elderly and disabled people, who simply are unable to comfortably walk across the park in order to get the single bus that runs on the east side of the lake once an hour. This means that their lives shrink, because they are so careful with their money, mainly, that they won't hire a taxi in order to go and meet a friend or some other social occasion, and they stop going out. Yes, they can get food delivered, but if they don't have relatives nearby who are going to take them places, they simply don't go anywhere.

So, this is just a massive issue, and the cause of this is very much down to the fact that we are unable to control exactly where the routes are that serve what is a very urban constituency. Even in urban constituencies, we have massive problems of people becoming socially isolated as a result of the shortage of buses and the lack of control over where we need buses to go. It is pointless in such circumstances to have a bus pass—a freedom pass—if there are no buses. So, I do hope that, together, we can move forward on ensuring that the money we spend on buses, which is considerable, can be better organised so that we can ensure that everybody has equity in their access to a bus.