Staff shortages have led a bus company to cut the frequency of vehicles on popular routes.

The changes will see buses arrive a few minutes further apart, but Brighton and Hove Buses hope the move will mean they are more reliable.

Roger French, managing director, apologised to passengers for unavoidable gaps in some services recently.

He said the idea of the changes was to reduce buses to fit the number of staff available and then offer a reliable service.

He said: "Because of staff shortages there are occasions when we are a driver down on a route and it has been difficult to maintain the service. This means a bus might be missing on a route where there should be one every eight minutes and people have had to wait up to 16 minutes.

By reducing the frequency to every ten minutes, for which we have enough drivers, it should improve our reliability and people won't have to wait so long."

Brighton and Hove Buses has already cut the frequency of buses during daytime on the popular Metro route 7 between Hove and Kemp Town.

Now it is likely that daytime frequencies on Metro route 1 from Mile Oak to Whitehawk will be reduced from the end of July.

The new times will not affect evening and weekend schedules and number 1 and 5 buses will still coincide with the shift patterns of staff and visiting hours for patients at the Royal Sussex County Hospital.

Mr French said that further reductions were likely later on Metro route 5 from Hangleton to Patcham, cutting the frequency from five to six minutes in the town centre.

The bus company has more than 600 drivers but is currently short of about 50 recruits.