15/03/2006

The partners operating inter-city coach services in Scotland said today (15 March 2006) they were “surprised and disappointed” at the decision by the Office of Fair Trading to refer the joint venture to the Competition Commission.

Tom Wileman, Managing Director of the Stagecoach-Scottish Citylink joint venture, said: “We are surprised and disappointed at the decision of the Office of Fair Trading - not just for our business but for our passengers.

“We do not believe there was any need to refer the joint venture to the Competition Commission, particularly as it has delivered the biggest improvement to inter-city coach services in Scotland in years.

“We are confident that when the Commission looks at the issue in detail it will realise that the main competition to the coach is inter-city rail services run by First ScotRail. First ScotRail is operated by FirstGroup, which is the dominant bus and rail operator in Scotland, with an almost 70% share of public transport revenues.

“The improvements made by our inter-city coach joint venture have marked the return of the coach as a real alternative to the train in Scotland by offering a simpler timetable and faster, more frequent journeys, with excellent value-for-money fares.”

ENDS

For further information, please contact:
Steve Stewart, Head of Media and Public Affairs, Stagecoach Group
Tel: 01738 442111 or mobile 07764 774680

NOTES TO EDITORS

On 12 September 2005, a new joint venture was created to operate the Scottish services of Stagecoach’s megabus.com and Motorvator, and Braddell PLC’s Scottish Citylink.

Stagecoach acquired 35% of the share capital of Scottish Citylink Limited (“Citylink”) in return for transferring certain rights to the Motorvator and megabus.com operations in Scotland. Braddell PLC owns the remaining 65% of Citylink’s share capital.

The joint venture operates services under the megabus.com and Scottish Citylink brands, and is the leading provider of express coach services in Scotland.