A delegated decision has been made by Cllr Dawn Cousins, Cabinet Member for Children’s Services and Education, on changes to the home to education transport policy.
The report reveals that no change has been made to the arrangements for transport to faith schools which were approved by Cabinet in December 2011.
Adverse impact on local traffic
Local campaigner for school bus travel, Chris Whitehouse, says, “My position has always been clear. I do not support the removal of discretionary concessionary travel from sixth formers or faith school students since this has an adverse impact upon traffic levels, particularly in Wellington Road and the surrounding estates.
“But the Council is clearly determined to press ahead and what we need to do now is to make sure that there are alternative Southern Vectis buses which can be used by affected students.”
Option 1 approved
Cllr Cousins approved the following option, the call-in period of which expires at 5pm on 31st August:
To approve the Home to Education Transport Policy 2013. The Policy has recently been subject to the annual review and has been amended to reflect the changes in primary school admission arrangements which were determined in May 2012.
From September 2013, primary school admissions will be based on the distance each child lives from their nearest school, and not on priority areas, as they are currently.
The Home to Education Transport Policy has therefore been amended to remove all reference to primary school priority areas, but this does not affect the entitlement criteria for free transport.
Both documents detailing the changes are embedded below for your convenience.
Image: rbrwr under CC BY-SA 2.0
