PASSENGERS have been urged to contact First Bus directly with their frustrations about an ever-worsening poor service which has been heavily criticised by local people.

Cllr Keith Wheatley, of Wellington Town Council, appealed to Somerset Council to take positive action in trying to improve the important 22, 22A, 22B and X22 services between Wellington and Taunton.

But Cllr Richard Wilkins, Somerset Council’s transport and waste services spokesman, said: “These services are almost entirely operated commercially by First South West Ltd (better known as First Bus), with only the evening journeys after 8pm funded by Somerset Council, and as such we have limited power to intervene directly in these operations.

“We are aware that in the lead up to Christmas, First South West were experiencing some technical issues in relation to the way some of their services were provided which caused some significant disruption as the number of drivers needed to operate services temporarily increased.

“Our understanding is that these issues have now been resolved and just prior to Christmas we noted a significant improvement to the problems that were being experienced earlier in the month.

“Our transport team were aware of these problems and we received several complaints about the services directly affected and more general complaints about other services during this disruption. Our transport team work closely with both the FE Colleges in Taunton but are not aware of any specific complaints from either of the two colleges about services from Wellington during this period.”

Cllr Wilkins said it was important that passengers raised their concerns and “we advise that in the first instance they should approach the operator concerned - in this case First South West – and urge passengers to contact the operator direct.”

People can phone 0345 646 0707 between 9am and 5pm Monday to Friday or write by e-mail through the website www.firstbus.co.uk.

“However, if problems persist we are happy to take these up directly with the commercial operator, but we do need details - times and dates and the nature of the issue - and in the case of First South West our passenger transport team meet with them once a month and will raise any persistent issues reported to us with them, seeking assurances that they are aware of the issues and the measures they are taking to resolve them,” added Cllr Wilkins.

“There are of course many reasons why bus services are delayed or cancelled and some of these are not within the control of the bus operator, but for those that are we expect the operator to take all possible actions to rectify the situation as soon as possible and in the meantime keep passengers updated on the nature of the issue and when and how it will be resolved.”

Cllr Wilkins added that people could contact the council about bus problems via the passenger transport team by e-mail [email protected] or by calling Somerset Direct on 0300 123 2224.

Cllr Wheatley was unimpressed by the response from County Hall and during Wellington Town Council’s monthly meeting on January 6 said Cllr Wilkins was “passing the buck.”