Sir – The long-overdue switch to joint ticketing and timetabling of city bus services is indeed very welcome, and the county council is to be congratulated for using the last government’s legislation to good effect.

But, before we grow accustomed to this more efficient way of organising our bus services, there are important lessons to learn for public services generally.

It was the Thatcher government that legislated for deregulation and competition in local transport services, and we have them to thank for the excessive number of under-used buses that have been congesting our city-centre streets and (until recently) contributing to Oxford’s appalling air quality record. Yet competition has manifestly failed in Oxford to deliver acceptably low fares, even on busy City routes served by two or more ‘willing providers’.

Why then should we have any confidence in coalition government policies introducing similar, artifically diverse ‘markets’ in other areas of public service like health and education? Here Thatcherite zeal for deregulation and competition as the cure for all ills still burns undimmed, even though shareholders benefit more than service-users from such remedies.

The lesson from Oxford’s buses is that sensible co-ordination and refinement of an existing system can often deliver what we need much better than wholesale reform and unbridled competition.

Robin Gill, Headington