There is "no sign" of Edinburgh Council's annual £6 million dividend from Lothian Buses returning, bosses have said, as the pandemic continues to impact public transport patronage.
The number of passengers boarding services run by the council-owned bus firm has recovered, although not fully, after patronage fell by over 90 per cent at the start of the Covid-19 outbreak.
Head of finance for Edinburgh City Council Hugh Dunn explained there's been a "lag on people coming back to public transport", adding that additional funds from the Scottish Government to keep bus companies afloat are now no longer being paid.
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In past years the council - which owns 91 per cent of Lothian Buses - received £6m a year from revenue, however since the pandemic the local authority has not received the dividend and has budgeted it as a loss.
Quizzing officers at the finance committee on Thursday (September 8), Conservative councillor Graeme Bruce said: "Covid has had an impact on all walks of life and with regards to the revenue streams from trams and buses, do you have any short to medium concerns going forward about those revenue streams?"
Mr Dunn said: "I think at the moment there's a lag on people coming back to public transport, during Covid people were told not to in some ways use transport et cetera so there has been a lag, working from home means there's not the same number of commuters that was there before, buses were supported and so was trams by the Government but that funding has come to an end.
"What it means for us is there's no sign of our dividend returning. We used to get £6 million dividend from the bus company and I think for the foreseeable future there will be no dividend coming to the council."
Cllr Bruce asked if it would return to the council's coffers in the next five years but the finance chief said it looked unlikely.
"I'm never to say never," Mr Dunn replied, "but I don't see it in the foreseeable future because the bus company have got their own pressures to deliver a low emission fleet going forward and money going to that".
He added: "First of all we need to make sure we've got a sound operational bus company before we look at getting dividends from it in the future so I wouldn't see it being featured in the four-year financial plan that we're drawing up just now - there's no assumption of bus dividend income coming to the council."
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