WILTSHIRE Council has announced today that funding has been secured to keep the current Royal United Hospital Hopper Bus service running until April 2016.

Money from the Better Care Fund will be used to ensure the current service remains until the end of the current financial year, while Wiltshire Council and Wiltshire Clinical Commissioning Group continue to work together to develop a more financially sustainable service from April 1, 2016.

Later this year, there will be a full consultation on what an amended service could look like after April 1.

All comments received during the consultation period will be taken into consideration before a decision is made on how the service will operate from that date.

More information on the consultation will be available in the near future.

Philip Whitehead, cabinet member responsible for transport, said: “When we presented the budget at full council in February we said we would reduce the subsidy on this service and work with our partners to ensure it is maintained. I am delighted that we have achieved this.

“We will continue to work with our partners to make further progress with the aim of enabling a sustainable service in the future for people who really need it.”

The service currently costs the council £10.65 per passenger per trip for the RUH service.

Leader of Wiltshire Council Jane Scott told users of the RUH Hopper bus that they “shouldn’t have worried in the first place” at a meeting last month, after a petition to stop the service being axed was presented to the council.

The petition, which was signed by more than 2,500 people, was handed in at the council’s Health and Wellbeing Board meeting, after being launched by Independent Councillors Terry Chivers and Jeff and Helen Osborn.

It was started after the council announced earlier this year that it would be cutting £130,000 from its budget to fund the RUH Hopper, causing upset and outrage among the elderly users of the service.

The bus, also known as Connect 2, transports residents from North and West Wiltshire to the Royal United Hospital in Bath and is mainly used by those who rely on it to get to hospital appointments.

Wiltshire and Trowbridge Cllr Osborn said: “We welcome any commitment to continuing the service, but we will need to look at the proposals in more detail. It proves that the people can make a difference and I thank everyone for their support.”