IT SEEMS as if people power has won the day in the county over the RUH Hopper bus - now Wiltshire Council says it is perfectly safe for at least another year.

While the hundreds of people who use it regularly, and signed petitions to save it, are extremely grateful, it does beg the question: why was so much panic caused in the first place?

If the council knew all along it never intended for the bus to go, and only wanted to make the hospital trust that runs the Royal United aware of what a good thing it was, and make them pay for it, surely some more sympathetic way could have been found to do that?

Instead of saying that the council was ending the contract with the bus company which has run such a popular and successful means of transport, and letting a storm of protest build. It's almost as if the council wants to give the impression that its decisions are made in response to pressure from the electorate.