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Angela Watkinson (Upminster) (Con): I oppose the Bill. It is presented as being optional, but in reality local education authorities will be forced by budgetary pressures to implement it.
Choosing the right school for their children is a major decision for parents: I remember it and the anxiety that accompanied it very well. One of my daughters has just completed the application form for one of her sons to transfer to secondary school, so I am experiencing for the second time round the anxiety of waiting to see whether the school that has been allocated is the one of choice.
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All parents want their children to have the best possible start in life, and their choice of school is made with that in mind. All sorts of reasons contribute to their choice. Some parents choose the school nearest to their home because that is the most important factor to them, whereas others reject the closest school because they think that its academic reputation is poor or they get a bad impression from the students as they move about in public. They might prefer a different specialism from the one offered by their local school, or they may want a denominational school of the faith to which they adhere. Their children might want to go to the school that their friends will attend, or they might want a school near their after-school child minder. There are countless reasons for parents' choice of school. The important thing is that it should be their choice and not one determined by the affordability of travel. The Bill will force many parents to send their children to their nearest school, whether they choose it or not.
The Education and Skills Committee's report on the draft School Transport Bill states:
"The Secretary of State for Education and Skills has said that the main aim of the draft School Transport Bill 'is the encouragement of people to go to their local neighbourhood school . . .' The Secretary of State's interpretation of the Bill's objectives seems directly to conflict with Government policies on diversity of schools and parental preference, which increase mobility . . . The draft Bill makes no legal requirement for children from low-income families to receive free transport to any school which is not their nearest school. It is therefore hard to see how the Bill will extend parental choice to low-income families."
The Bill retains the statutory walking distances of 2 miles for primary school children and 3 miles for secondary pupils. Those distances date back to the 19th century and are no longer applicable to 2004 living. The Library explains the term "statutory walking distance" as
"the shortest route along which a child, accompanied as necessary, may walk with reasonable safety."
That is a familiar term to me because in a previous incarnation I was the chairman of the infamous committee to which the hon. Member for Braintree (Mr. Hurst), who is no longer in his place, referred. The names and places that he mentioned were familiar to me.
The committee used to get into a minibus, go round the county and walk the routes from school to home where parents had appealed against refusal of discretionary transport. There were many reasons why on paper it looked as though the child was not entitled to free transport. However, having walked the routes, as the hon. Member for Braintree recounted, we crossed ditches and railway lines. I even recall walking through the yard of a pig farm. There are many reasons for appeals. Having travelled the routes and seen the practical problems in getting children to school, even where the statutory home-to-school distance is not breached, it is clear that there has to be a huge amount of discretion in granting free transport.
I am rather concerned about using free school meals as a measure. I shall refer to the Select Committee report again. It says that it had
"serious reservations about the adequacy of 'free school meals' as a definition for the category of protected children. Many families eligible for free school meals do not claim their entitlement. In these cases, local authorities may have difficulty in ascertaining who is eligible for free transport. Free school meal entitlement is available to those whose family income is below £13,200 per year.
- Families whose income is just above this level, particularly large families, may be significantly disadvantaged by the new regime and the 'cut-off' income level may cause just as much inequity as the arbitrary limits of walking distances."
I believe that the arrangements for school transport in London authorities are slightly different from those elsewhere in that they have to provide local implementation plans that comply with the transport strategy of the Mayor of London. Do the Government intend to abandon those plans and establish an entirely new regime, or are the Bill's provisions compatible with Transport for London's arrangements?
I spoke to Havering education authority this morning, which I imagine is like many London education authorities in that there is not a great deal of discretionary transport, because there are many schools close to one another and, in general, the distance from home to school is quite short. The only exception might arise where a family with school-age children move into the borough and find that the schools within walking distance of their home have no spare capacity, requiring them to send their children to the next town, although it must be said that that is unusual. In the main, London education authorities provide free school transport for children with special educational needs, and their budget includes only a small discretionary component. They are unlikely to be significantly affected by the Bill, and will certainly be affected far less than rural and semi-rural areas.
Hon. Members will have received lobbying material from the National Autistic Society, the Royal National Institute of the Blind and Mencap, which are concerned about the provision of transport for children with special needs. The Secretary of State assured the House that statemented children and special educational needs children who have not been statemented will still receive free transport, but he did not specify what sort. The Bill, partly by encouraging people to send their children to the nearest school, implies that children should use mainstream public transport. However, such transport is unsuitable for certain categories of special needs children, even if they are not statemented. The organisations that I mentioned would therefore like the Bill to enshrine a promise that transport will be suitable for the individual child's needs. Some children, for example, cannot travel without an escort and cannot cope with large numbers of children on mainstream transport.
In conclusion, the Government's plan to charge children for school transport is another third-term tax rise. Parents who send their children to rural, semi-rural or denominational schools will be particularly disadvantaged by charging schemes, as those journeys are likely to be the longest. All parents, however, especially those with several children of school age, will be concerned about the proposals. The discretionary element of many LEA school transport budgets was squeezed last year following the funding crisis, and it is likely to disappear altogether when the new charging arrangements are introduced. The choice of school will be dominated by the cost of the journey from home to school and, in practice, will mean no choice at all for many parents, who will be forced to send their child to the school for which they can afford the travel, even if
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they would not otherwise have chosen it. Charging for school transport deprives parents of choice, and the Government should think again.
4.52 pm
Mr. Roger Williams (Brecon and Radnorshire) (LD): I apologise for not being present at the beginning of the debate, Mr. Deputy Speaker, as I had an unavoidable engagement. I wish to participate, however, as the Bill is of particular importance to my constituency, which is the largest in England and Wales. Indeed, the population in Powys is three times as sparse as it is in Cumbria, which many people believe to be one of the most sparsely populated counties.
Members who represent rural areas are obviously the most concerned about the Bill, even though it allows authorities to set up pilots. Many education authorities do not wish to engage in the programme, but the financial pressures on them will be such that they will be strongly encouraged to do so. My own county of Powys, which spends more per head on school transport than any other county in Wales and, I suspect, England, believes that the money that it receives from the Assembly through the standard spending assessment and the calculation of local government grant is not enough to support the school transport system, and it has to use money that it would otherwise spend directly on education.
The Bill is urbancentric, and does not address rural reality, as a number of hon. Members have argued. The hon. Member for Stafford (Mr. Kidney) spoke about a village just inside the 3-mile limit. I can speak from my experience as a county councillor before I became a Member of Parliament. In Talgarth, the line went straight through the town, so half the families had to pay for their school transport while the other half got it free. Strangely, as happens in these things, those in the less well-off part of town had to pay, while the better-off got it free.
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