Lord Adonis agrees with me...

In my election leaflet (available through all good letter boxes in your area now), one of the things I argue that the county council should do is::

"Introduce a countywide ‘oyster-style’ card for bus, train and taxi travel"

ie an integrated smart card for public transport.

Meanwhile, Lord Adonis has been heading up the North East Independent Economic Review commissioned by the North East Local Enterprise Partnership - the Review recommendations are now published, and one of the main recommendations on transport is:

"A key priority, which needs to be agreed by mid-2013, is the joint commitment of the bus operators association and Nexus/the LA7 to introduce competitively-priced all-operator smartcard ticketing for the North East, as good as or better than London’s Oyster, to be available by autumn 2014."

ie an integrated smart card for buses across Northumberland, Tyne & Wear and Co Durham.

Great minds think alike!