Our bankrupt city council has new contacts available for subsidised bus services across Stoke-on-Trent. Across being the operative word. Looking at the list, I see that everything goes to the city centre, i.e. Hanley. But who wants to go up to Hanley these days? (I don’t count the popular Festival Park as Hanley).

This is the key problem with the Potteries bus services. It’s an ungainly two part spoke-and-hub system, everything going via the bus stations in either Hanley or Newcastle-under-Lyme.

What we need to at least try for six months is an ‘inner circle’ and ‘outer circle’ bus, akin to Birmingham’s famous No. 11. Neither such service would go anywhere near the bus stations, but would just circle.

Incidentally, none of the Council’s new proposals are to restore the No. 101 Sunday service (recently cut completely). The 101 is the supposed ‘flagship’ showcase route for the Potteries.