Our Community Strategy
As the UK's largest provider of public transport services, our operations touch all members of the community such as customers, neighbours, employees, businesses and residents.
Our relationship with the local communities we serve is therefore very important to us and an essential part of supporting the growth of our business.
Through our core business we serve the community in a number of ways:
- In developing our services we seek to engage with communities and promote socially inclusive policies;
- Working in partnerships with local authorities and local businesses we seek to promote sustainable travel which will reduce congestion, improve quality of life and play a major role in supporting local economic activity; and
- As a major employer we seek to ensure that we offer employment opportunities to all sectors of the community through non-discriminatory policies and promote opportunities for disadvantaged and vulnerable groups through our relationship with Jobcentre Plus.
However, our community engagement extends far beyond these activities and includes a wide range of community initiatives, partnerships, charitable fundraising and volunteering schemes driven largely through our local operating companies.
Strategy Purpose
First is global in scale but local in delivery. Typically our people live in the communities they serve. We have always actively engaged with the local communities in the areas we operate and have in place wide ranging community initiatives, we believe these can be strengthened by incorporating them within a Group wide framework. The purpose of this community strategy is to provide the framework to strengthen our community engagement activities, building on the many initiatives already in place and strengthening the monitoring and co-ordination of community based activity across the Group.
The following strategy focuses on our UK activities but will be supported by an equivalent strategy for implementation in North America.
Strategy Focus
In each of the focus areas we will be seeking to improve co-ordination and strengthen current activity. (Read more about our focus areas)