Steph McGovern

And with me, Robert Peston.

So Manchesterism, talk me through it.

Well, let's just look at that from the perspective of the buses, because if you look at what he has done there, as you mentioned, so it's...

the process, this kind of essentially deregulation has cost £134 million.

That has been raised mainly through local taxation and borrowing.

So, it's been paying for things like the transition costs and the upfront capital purchases, the new staff, the purchase of the depots and things like that.

So,

So locally, the local leaders are saying, and Andy Burnham, of course, is saying this has actually improved things and it's been worth the money.

So 80% of the services are now on time compared to 69% when the network was deregulated.

And then you've got mayors in other cities now looking at how they can replicate it.

So you've got Liverpool and West Yorkshire, and they're using this previous legislation to essentially franchise their networks.

and in terms of how they're raising it.

No, no, but I think it's worth looking at it, though, at the local level to see whether it can be replicated on the bigger level because then you're asking how were they raising this money?

So, you know, I mentioned it was through, for Manchester, it was through taxation and various things.

What they're looking at in these other areas is, you know, whether it's

tolls, so bridge tolls or local tunnel tolls and that type of thing, as well as through borrowing and other ways.

But the point is the finances can be hard to stack up even regionally on all of this, especially the kind of beginning cost of this.

So how much is it worth, that initial investment?

will it reap the rewards that you want?

But something has to change, doesn't it?