| Previous Section | Index | Home Page |
Roger Casale (Wimbledon) (Lab): I welcome this Bill. It is modest, sensible, practical and long overdue, and it will allow local authorities such as mine in Merton to experiment further with reducing traffic on the school run through the introduction of safe cycle routes, walking bus schemes and so on. That should be encouraged.
I am at a loss to understand why the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Collins), the Opposition spokesman, and his party should have chosen to oppose this sensible measure so rigorously. For three reasons, their opposition will ring rather hollow. First, the Conservative party had plenty of opportunity when in office to deal with this matter, yet did nothing. The hon. Gentleman seemed to suggest that it was a virtue that there had been no change, modernisation or reform in more than 60 years.
28 Oct 2004 : Column 1622
Secondly, a Conservative Government would not be able to afford even the modest £50 million that is expected to be needed for this measure's introduction. The Opposition's current education budget proposals mean that the money would not be there. Thirdly, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said, many Conservative local authorities around the country are looking forward to this Bill. It is a great shame that we are not able to achieve a measure of cross-party support even for a measure as sensible as this.
Mr. Collins: The hon. Gentleman said something extraordinary—that a Conservative Government could not afford even £50 million from their schools budget. Is he not aware that my right hon. Friend the shadow Chancellor has committed the Conservative party to increasing school spending, not just by £50 million, but by £15 billion a year by the end of the next Parliament?
Roger Casale: This is not a debate about the Opposition's education budget. All sorts of incredible and incompatible claims have been made, and we shall see what their actual proposals turn out to be.
The Opposition's claims about this Bill ring hollow. It is a pity that we cannot achieve a measure of cross-party support for a measure as sensible and practical as this.
Although I would not say that the Bill has a deficiency, we should take this opportunity to address a number of issues that I believe merit cross-party support. In particular, there is a need to do much more for the parents of children with special educational needs, and for the children themselves. Safe transport between home and school must be secured for those children.
This debate provides an opportunity to consider the difficulties that still exist, in Merton and many other local authority areas, with the safe transportation of children with special educational needs. The Bill might offer a suitable vehicle to reform the regulations governing this area, and I look forward to exploring that possibility further in Standing Committee.
I should like to share with the House some of our experiences in Merton, and the difficulties that we have encountered. The problems are a source of wide concern and have been raised by various organisations. In preparation for this debate, Mencap wrote to me and many other hon. Members to make the point that many families with children with a learning disability experience difficulty in accessing appropriate transport to school. Along with the National Autistic Society, Mencap is concerned that the Bill makes no mention of the special transport needs of disabled pupils. That is why I felt it very important to add my voice to the debate on these matters, and to examine whether this Bill is the right vehicle for reform.
At the end of 2001, I was approached by Mary Powell. She is the mother of an autistic daughter who attends Merton's very good St. Ann's special school. Her daughter is transported between home and school by minicab. All sorts of problems have arisen in connection with that transport, which involves a minicab, a driver and an escort to ensure that the child is not left alone in the car. We should remember that children such as Mary Powell's daughter have great difficulty in expressing themselves, which makes it very difficult to know what happens during the journey between home and school.
28 Oct 2004 : Column 1623
On one occasion there was a 25-minute delay, and longer delays have been reported. Naturally, that caused concern among parents, and Mary Powell contacted me to say that she had raised those concerns with Merton council. However, the council had not been able to say where her child had been for those 25 minutes, even though the problem had recurred over a period of weeks. During that time, Mrs. Powell noticed that her daughter had become distressed, but she still had no clear explanation of what had happened. In her letter to me, Mrs. Powell said that her daughter was autistic and had learning disabilities and that she was unable to tell anyone about what happened on the school journey. In fact, there are many more examples of what Mrs. Powell called "dangerous practice".
Mrs. Powell did the right thing and got together with parents of children with similar difficulties who shared her anxieties. The parents formed an SEN network and raised their concerns with Merton council in an appropriate way, but found it very difficult to get the council to take action. Indeed, they found it very difficult even to secure a meeting with the officers concerned. It was not clear where the responsibility lay and, although I do not question their good faith or want to suggest that they were not trying to do their best, there was a tendency on the part of those officers to put their heads in the sand. It is possible that they were not sure how to address this difficult issue, or perhaps they did not have the resources to resolve it.
In addition, the parents found it difficult to arrange a meeting with the directors of social services and education. It was difficult to get anyone to acknowledge that there was a problem, but once it was acknowledged that a problem existed it was difficult to get anyone to take responsibility or to act. Over a long period of time, the parents saw no improvement in the situation.
One of the biggest difficulties—and one of the parents' greatest concerns—was that many of the minicab drivers and escorts involved in the transportation of their children between home and school were not being properly vetted by the police. In fact, Mary Powell and her colleagues in the SEN network conducted a little experiment: they telephoned the minicab company contracted by Merton council to provide the service in an attempt to get a job as a driver. They recorded the conversation, and when they asked about police checks, the minicab firm told them not to worry about it. That increased the parents' concern.
I think that the House will agree that that is bad practice and that it needs to be stamped out. The difficulty experienced by Mary Powell—ultimately, it is the reason that she came to me with this matter—was that there is no way of knowing where responsibility in this problem lies, nor how the problem can be solved.
Whose responsibility is it to make sure that police checks are conducted and followed through? Would not it be better for the local authority to provide the service, even though there may be substantial cost implications? In that way, the authority could assure itself that minicab drivers and escorts were properly vetted and that they provided an appropriate level of service.
In the end, I had to get involved. I had meetings with council officers, but it took a long time to arrive at a plan of action. Progress was made only when I was able to
28 Oct 2004 : Column 1624
bring the matter to the attention of Ministers. Those Ministers included Baroness Ashton and my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State. Frequent meetings were held involving the Department for Education and Skills and Merton LEA, and they led to a review being conducted.
The difficulty, however, is that the law talks not about regulations but about guidelines. If a local authority is having difficulty or failing to meet the guidelines, it is difficult to see where we can go for redress. Ultimately, by working together, engaging in the review and committing ourselves to introduce improvements, changes have been made. Drivers and escorts are now required to have badges. The local authority has redrafted the policy document on SEN transport. Reviews and surveys are being undertaken, and it is examining the feasibility of becoming a minicab operator itself.
Three years on, it is still a problem; all of us, including the local authority, have acknowledged it. Janet Yerbury, who works for the local education authority, said at a recent meeting with parents of children with special educational needs:
"It is an issue that can keep you awake in the middle of the night. Where we are completely stuck is that we cannot carry out checks on other mini cab employees . . . It is something we are still trying to improve upon."
There is a tendency to think that all the good work that is going on in improving social services and education always takes proper account of the needs of special educational needs children. Unfortunately, my experience is that we have failed to do so effectively. We must examine whether we need to tighten the law, introduce stronger regulations, especially on the safety aspects of transport for children with special educational needs, and provide the appropriate resources so that councils cannot hide behind the claim that they are unable to act properly because they do not have the money. The most vulnerable children are those whose rights we must do most to protect. There is a tendency to think that because of their vulnerability they will be properly looked after. Sadly, in many cases they are exactly the people who are left out.
I support the Bill. I understand that it is not aimed directly at the transportation of children with special educational needs, but rather at how we get people out of cars and find alternatives for them to get to school. I also understand that it is a modest measure that is aimed at certain pilot areas. However, we should examine—perhaps we can come back to this in Committee—whether the Bill provides a vehicle to address the serious deficiency in the law that led to the situation that I described. That problem exists in many other authorities and has proved difficult to do anything about.
At the same time as introducing the measure, can we also make the necessary changes to the law so that there is no question of anyone failing in providing the right level of transport and safety for disabled children? My constituent Mary Powell and other parents of children with special educational needs would like that to happen. I think that my local authority would now like that to happen, and we are working together to improve the situation, but it is difficult. Mencap and other such organisations also want the law changed. I hope that the
28 Oct 2004 : Column 1625
Government will listen to our representations and see how we can address the issues during the passage of this sensible Bill.
3.3 pm
| Next Section | Index | Home Page |