Routemaster conductors will cost £8m says Boris

Employing conductors to work on a new fleet of Routemasters to replace bendy buses would cost just £8 million a year, Boris Johnson claimed today.

The Tory mayoral challenger wants to launch a competition to design a new version of the London double-decker, with its open rear deck and conductors.

His rival Ken Livingstone claims that bringing back conductors would add a couple of pounds a week to council tax bills, while Transport for London buses boss David Brown said it would cost £600million to replace the capital's 337 bendy buses with Routemasters.

Speaking on BBC London radio today, Mr Johnson said the true cost of employing conductors on replacement Routemasters was insignificant when contrasted with the amount TfL spends on consultants - more than £210 million in 2006/7.

He said: "It's absolutely true that if you are going to bring back a Routemaster, or have a new Routemaster, you would need a conductor with them. I have looked at the expense of that. It would cost £8million to have conductors on each of these buses per year"

A spokeswoman for Ken Livinsgtone thinks Mr Johnson has got his sums wrong. "There are currently just under 400 bendy buses. To achieve the same capacity with the Routemaster design would require at least 200 more buses. Conductors on the 600 new buses would cost £70million a year," she said.