FREE and cheap travel for hundreds of pensioners faces the axe while day centre prices could rise under new council cost-cutting plans.

Moves by Oxfordshire County Council would:

  • End free travel on the Dial-A-Ride service for national free bus pass users.
  • End cheap travel for most OAPs to and from seven council day centres.
  • Raise day centre charges as a result of changes to centre budgets.

The three proposals are being put out to consultation.

About 900 OAPs get the council’s Dial-A-Ride service free with their bus pass in Oxford and the Vale of White Horse and West Oxfordshire districts.

They now face daily charges of £4-£6 for the service, which picks OAPs up from their front door for trips such as doctors’ appointments.

The move will save the council £100,000 a year.

Wheelchair-bound Gwynneth Pedler, 85, of Oxfordshire Unlimited disability group, said: “There will be pensioners living on just a state pension, and this will leave them isolated.”

The Cumnor Hill resident said: “The feeling among users is that this will not be accepted.”

The council also wants to end heavily subsidised transport to and from day centres, currently 82p a day, to save £1.35m.

It said OAPs will instead have to arrange their own transport to the centres, used by 740 people.

About 30 per cent will get means-tested cash help from the council, which OAPs can decide where to spend. The rest will have to pay.

And it admits centre entry costs would rise as a result of a change to how they are funded.

The total budget will be cut from £1,813,729 to £350,000 a year, leaving private firms or charities to take over their running.

This means they would face having to make up the rest through higher charges. It says a “realistic unit cost” will have to be charged to “maximise income potential”.

Day centre user John Hewer, 96, from New Cross Road, Headington, said: “I am afraid these changes will close the day centres because it undermines them.”

Mr Hewer, who goes to Oxford Options Resource Centre, in Horspath Driftway, said the move would lead to centre closures.

He said: “People who are on their own and in not very good health go out to the day centres once a week, and it is heaven.

“But increasing the cost will stop people coming and the centres will not be able to go on.”

Bernard Bovingdon, 74, from Bicester Day Centre’s user group, said: “These changes will probably destroy some of our people.”

Arash Fatieman, responsible for social care at the county council, said cash had to go to the poorest pensioners, and fees would not “rise significantly”.

And he said volunteers could step in to transport the elderly.

“We have made a firm commitment to day services.

“If we wanted to close them, we would have decided not to fund them at all.

“Day centres play a valuable role in helping older people lead more independent lives, but we are changing the way we deliver them.”

He said he did not want to speculate what the new costs would be.

The county council-run day centres are:

  • Abingdon Resource and Wellbeing Centre, Audlett Drive.
  • Banbury Day Centre, Britannia Road.
  • Bicester Resource Centre, Launton Road.
  • Didcot Day Centre, Britwell Road.
  • Oxford Options Resource and Wellbeing Centre, Horspath Driftway.
  • Wallingford Day Centre, Westgate House.
  • Wantage Day Centre, Garston Lane.