COUNCILS have agreed a scheme for free pensioner bus travel, but passengers will still pay for many journeys.

If they have council-issued concessionary passes, retired and registered disabled people in Durham will not have to pay to travel in their home district, but will have to pay half-fare for the portion of a journey that crosses district council boundaries.

The scheme, agreed by the heads of the county's seven district councils, is due to start on April 1 and will be reviewed in October.

Negotiations about its implementation will be held with bus companies operating in the county.

A county-wide scheme of half-fare travel funded by the districts has been operating for some years, but is being altered because the Government is implementing Labour's election manifesto pledge of free travel.

The scheme has been widely criticised because what has been seen as a national scheme will only operate locally.

Alex Watson, leader of Labour-run Derwentside Council, said most elderly and disabled passengers would be better off despite the scheme's flaws.

He said swipe cards and on-board machines to read them would have to be bought to run the scheme.

He also said the councils did not know what the scheme -which is more generous than the statutory minimum of district-wide free travel -would cost because there could be increased bus use because of the limited free travel offer.

He said: "In Derwentside, we have set aside £1.5m for the scheme, but if take-up doubled, where would we find the other £1.5m?

"Do you close leisure centres or cut other services to pay for it?

"It is not the national free travel scheme the Government said it would be. People in County Durham will not be able to go to Sunderland and Newcastle, London or anywhere else for free."

Carol Woods, a cabinet member of Liberal Democrat-controlled Durham City Council, said that in Scotland, the scheme applied to travel anywhere in the country, and that in big urban areas such as Tyne and Wear, residents would be able to travel over a wide area for free.

She said: "It is a postcode lottery in terms of where you live and what is available in that area."