Only about half of bus passengers feel they are getting good value for money, research shows.

Independent watchdog Passenger Focus asked passengers in West Yorkshire what they thought about local services.

Only 56 per cent felt they were getting good value for money.

Results were better for punctuality, which got an approval rating of 79 per cent – a nine per cent improvement on last year’s results.

Overall satisfaction was also up, at 88 per cent, compared to 85 per cent last year.

The chairman of transport authority Metro, Councillor James Lewis, welcomed the rising scores.

He said: “The bus operators’ efforts to achieve these improvements should be recognised but there is clearly more to do on value for money, which despite a one per cent improvement on last year, still lags significantly behind the other similar areas.

“There have been some fare reductions introduced locally since the Passenger Focus research was carried out and we have seen one small-scale initiative where the operators are prepared to accept each other’s tickets but while people are still generally being charged a premium to use more than one company’s services, dissatisfaction about cost is inevitable.”