HOW on earth can First justify a 50p increase in its day ticket? For my wife - who gets her value-for-money Rover ticket every day - this means she will have to stump up an extra £120 a year.

By any standards that is a massive increase in revenue.

I would say Mr Edwards was wrong to use Leeds as an example of how competition doesn't work and didn't bring prices down. Not only do they travel far greater distances for their money, they also have the Metro buses which are far cheaper, and the trains which charge a mere 90p single or £1.60 return to travel from out-of-town to the city centre station.

The bus fare increase cannot be justified by petrol costs which, apart from the odd blip, have been roughly the same for the last three years. Have the staff wages increased by 20 per cent over the last year? I think not.

So come on - where have all the extra costs come from? If these new buses are so much more economical to run surely the bus fares should be coming down?

Eddie Vee,

Wenham Road,

Woodlands, York.

Updated: 11:09 Friday, January 13, 2006