A Banbury community transport service has closed, leaving about 100 OAPs and disabled users stuck for buses.

Banburyshire Community Transport Association (BCTA) shut on Friday, after two decades serving north Oxfordshire residents.

Bosses said the charity could not afford to continue after failing to win a key council contract to provide dial-a-ride services.

The charity collapsed with the loss of more than 15 jobs.

Until April, BCTA got £187,500 from Cherwell District Council (CDC) and £26,364-a-year from Oxfordshire County Council to run dial-a-ride services.

The districtwide service ran five to seven buses five days a week for people to phone for trips like shopping and appointments.

But the county council took over the running of the service in April, awarding its own bus team the contract.

Cherwell then cut its contribution to dial-a-ride to £30,000, so the district now gets one bus for two days and two buses for three.

Bosses at BCTA continued to provide private trips but have now said these do not bring in enough cash to keep it afloat.

Among those to be hit is a weekly bingo club service to Yule Court Common Room, Boxhedge Square, Banbury, for £4 per person.

Organiser Sheila Speakman, 80, said: “It is disgraceful.

“We are in limbo. I am calling all my members to say this Wednesday’s bingo is cancelled.

“I will have to find alternative arrangements. What the alternative is I don’t know.”

The OAP – who has started a petition calling for more cash for Dial-a-Ride – said: “They seem to find money for other things.

“They are not looking after their senior citizens who have worked all their lives and haven’t asked for handouts.”

Charles Nixon-Eckersall, chairman of the Beaumont Business Centre-based BCTA, said Dial-a-Ride was its “core business”.

He said: “My board, over the last six months, have looked at this and the amount of money required would not have been raised by our contract work. It is a huge loss.”

It would have to surrender charity status and associated financial perks to carry on, he said.

But Kevin Powell, BCTA co-ordinator, said: “I am gutted that, after 19 years with the charity, the board feels they have to close it when there is enough finances to keep it going for six to eight months.”

He said: “The disabled and elderly are going to suffer because of their actions.”

County council deputy leader Rodney Rose was sorry to hear of the closure.

But the Conservative said: “In the world we are living in, we can’t go giving free transport to everybody who feels they have a right to it.”