Progress on school transport places in Hartlepool amid concerns children will miss out

Concerns had been raised that social-distancing measures will mean children losing out on school transport places.

But council chiefs have confirmed they are likely to provide ‘some’ concessionary travel permits for home-to-school transport in September.

Councillors also called for Hartlepool Borough Council to in the future review who is eligible for the local authority’s free statutory transport to school, raising concerns over the existing government guidelines.

The council has usually offered concessionary permits for spare seats on the school buses for a fee, but there had been concerns they would not be available to offer the seats in September.

Sally Robinson, director of children and joint commissioning services, said the transport team was working to ensure the best provision possible is available.

She said: “The current position is the council will likely be able to provide some concessionary travel permits for home to school transport, although capacity may be limited due to the impact of Covid and the number of eligible young people.

“The transport team are working on the figures to seek to provide as much capacity on the buses as possible, and make sure that will go as far as we can to meet the demand for concessionary seats.”

Councillors on the finance and policy committee backed the plans, but also called on the council to review the national statutory obligations for free home to school travel.

The council is obligated to provide free home to school transport for those who meet national criteria, which includes those who attend a school to meet special needs, or are on free school meals.

It is also available to those who live further than two miles from their nearest primary school and three miles from their nearest secondary, and for those who are attending their nearest suitable school but cannot reasonably be expected to walk due to the route being unsafe.

Cllr Brenda Harrison said: “I do think it’s expecting an awful lot of our young people to be walking so far there and back.

“Hartlepool winters are not known to be favourable.

“I think a lot of families in the town are struggling normally with home to school travel, and I do think we need to do something a little bit more robust about it.”

Cllr Christopher Akers-Belcher, who voted against the concessionary permits as he did not want to see children have to pay to get to school, also raised concerns over the statutory walking distances.

He said: “I’ve never really agreed with the statutory walking distance, I always think Hartlepool should be better than what the statutory walking distances are.

“I just think personally that is unacceptable and I would like something in the future for that to be reviewed.

“At the present time, the way that a lot of families are in crisis, I couldn’t support the reintroduction of charges for children to get to school.”

Early this year regulations were brought in which meant if a fare was charged for travel and there were more than 22 seated passengers, the vehicle would have to have several general accessibility requirements, including for wheelchairs.

As the council did not meet all of the requirements with its school travel, they therefore provided places for those travelling on concessionary permits for free from January to July 2020.

However council officers noted regulations have been altered to allow them to apply for an exemption, and an application has been submitted, meaning they can continue to charge for the concessionary permits, as has usually been the case.

They have also ordered two new vehicles compliant with all the regulations, to be delivered in October.

A message from the Editor:

With the coronavirus lockdown having a major impact on many of our advertisers - and consequently the revenue we receive - we are more reliant than ever on you taking out a digital subscription.

You can subscribe to this website and enjoy unlimited access to local news and information online and on our app. With a digital subscription, you can read more than 5 articles, see fewer ads, enjoy faster load times, and get access to exclusive newsletters and content. Simply click ‘Subscribe’ in the menu. You can subscribe to the newspaper with 20% off here: https://www.localsubsplus.co.uk/.