National Express counts the cost of franchise failure

The bus, coach and train operator's bottom-line result for 2009 was

also hit by restructuring charges and the 7.2m cost of defending itself against a series of takeover approaches.

Despite the challenging year, which also saw National Express raise 375m from shareholders in order to reduce a 1bn debt mountain, the company said it was in a better position than at the start of 2009.

It said one of its priorities was to build on the strong performance of its coach operation, which saw profits improve 27 per cent to 34.3m as the business showed resilience in the recession. It will also look to improve trading in its UK bus and North American school transport businesses.

National Express returned its loss-making East Coast franchise into state hands in November after running into trouble by overbidding for the deal before recession struck and crippled revenues from the franchise.

The company, which will also end its East Anglian and c2c commuter deals in 2011, said the total exceptional charge relating to the termination of the East Coast contract was 64.8m.

Stripping out one-off costs and losses generated by East Coast, National Express said group-wide profits would have been 142.5m in 2009, compared with 172.4m in 2008.

n A 'Dunkirk spirit' saw snowed-in Britons ditch their cars and turn to buses to ensure they made it into work last month, transport group Go-Ahead said.

The firm, which carries around 1.6 million bus passengers every day, said it saw a rise in fare paying bus passengers in January as passengers struggled into work and it did its best to keep services running in the snow.

Keith Ludeman, group chief executive, added: "There's something about the English character that when times are difficult, people really try their hardest to get into work, and we also had really good attendance in our bus depots."

But the adverse weather hit the firm's Govia rail business, which is jointly owned with French transport group Keolis. Its Southeastern rail franchise came in for particular criticism in a recent London Assembly report into the travel disruption after Go-Ahead ran only about half of its normal service.

Neighbouring train operators such as Govia-owned Southern and

Stagecoach's South West Trains attempted to provide either a full or slightly reduced service, according to the assembly's transport committee.