Greater Wellington regional councillor Daran Ponter is sworn in on Thursday, the day after the student fares vote. He would have supported the discount.

A bid to cut Wellington public transport fares by a quarter for students has failed, with one regional councillor saying it played low-income groups off against each other.

A group of Greater Wellington regional councillors, led by Sue Kedgley, pushed for the student discount to be included in the council's budget for the next financial year.

"The issue has been stalled now for a number of years, and students desperately need a reprieve from extremely high fares which see students in some parts of the region paying $85 per week to get to university."

She said students contributed $2 billion to the Wellington economy, and many were under "extreme stress" from high rents and public transport fares.

READ MORE:

* Promise of cheaper fares

* Students desperate over fare costs

The council had long planned to create an across-the-board, 25 per cent off-peak discount, but this would probably not start till 2018, she said.

"What I was saying is, 'Why don't we bring that concession forward for students?' "

The cost of the concession would probably be only about $1.5 million for the year, she said.

Sustainable transport committee chairman Paul Swain said bringing forward the discount but making it available only for students would not help the wider low-income community.

"We didn't want to be in the position of picking and choosing between one group of low-income people versus another."

He said the overall discount wasn't planned to start until at least 2018 when an integrated ticketing system was in place. In the meantime, no groups would get the discount.

But he said all public transport users had been given a cut in fares – of a kind – over the past three years. "Everyone's had a break because in the past three years there's been no fare increases."

There could be an additional discount above the 25 per cent that would come in post-2018, he said, but only if the council could gain contributions from Wellington City Council and Victoria University.

On Thursday, the day after the vote, Labour-backed candidate Daran Ponter was sworn in after being appointed by councillors to replace Fran Wilde, who had resigned her seat.

Ponter had made a joint campaign promise with Wellington city councillor and mayoral candidate Justin Lester to get student discounts if elected in October.

He said the failed vote just strengthened his resolve to make sure he got the numbers if elected in October.

Kedgley said the councillors would probably make another effort to introduce the discount when the annual plan was approved at the end of June.

SUPPORT FOR STUDENTS

Those who voted for a 25 per cent student concession on public transport were Sue Kedgley, Paul Bruce, Nigel Wilson and Sandra Greig.