House of Commons - Education and Skills

Select Committee on Education and Skills Third Report

2 Pilots

25. The main aim of the draft School Transport Bill is to trial new approaches to school transport. Under the provisions of the draft Bill, the Secretary of State will approve a number of school travel schemes. The draft Prospectus sets out the nature of these 'pilots':

"We intend to approve between 6 and 12 areas in England, covering up to 20 English LEAs, and up to 6 areas in Wales. Schemes may cover all or part of an individual LEA, or else two or more LEAs may collaborate to run a joint scheme. Where LEAs collaborate, each must have a separate application independently approved by the Secretary of State or the Assembly Government. We hope that as many schemes as possible will start in September 2006, running until the end of July 2010, or a later agreed date. Others may apply for approval to run schemes from September 2007 if there are fewer than 20 applications approved in the first round. We are seeking a balanced mix of schemes embracing rural and urban areas and focusing on a range of local priorities.

DfES and the Welsh Assembly Government will separately evaluate schemes and separately decide by 31 July 2011 whether or not the local scheme approach should continue and/or be extended to more LEAs. If either DfES or the Welsh Assembly decides to return to the old regime, scheme authorities will be able to terminate their schemes over a period of time by mutual agreement".[28]

Innovation without legislation

26. Evidence given to the Committee by local authority representatives, transport operators, schools and other interested parties strongly suggests that a wide range of innovative transport schemes are already running in different areas without the need for new legislation. These schemes are trialling a range of approaches, from the 'yellow bus' to the 'walking bus'.[29] Whilst most of our witnesses welcomed the Bill, saying that it promoted sustainable travel with environmental and health benefits, when pressed on the details of its provisions, most admitted that it would be perfectly possible to implement such schemes under the existing legislation. Evidence given by Tim Davies, Chairman of ATCO, typified this view:

"We certainly needed the action plan to focus attention on innovation and doing things differently. There is a lot wrong with the present school transport system […] maybe it is not absolutely necessary to have a Bill, but we do need to get some innovation and pilots clearly are a good way forward to test out the different approaches"[30]

27. Some witnesses claimed that the Bill might be detrimental to existing innovative travel schemes based around walking. Despite the Government's assertion that 'schemes do not have to enhance bus travel: they could focus in whole or in part on increasing cycling, car sharing or walking',[31] we detected a widespread perception that pilot schemes approved under the terms of the Bill would largely be concerned with motorised transport and the effect of charging. This view was expressed by John Sykes, Principal Engineer with Hertfordshire County Council, an authority that has a number of travel schemes in place, which encourage children to walk to school:

"My concern about the Bill is that it does not have those additional holistic overviews of other things which are happening that should be built into pilots. We have done a lot of research with University College London around linking our messages around health, independence and safety. Those three areas are key areas for most parents and most parents will react to those key areas at some stage in their child's development. What this Bill does not seem to pull out is that it is an important issue to address for whatever pilots come out of this programme […] it does contain all of those elements. Perhaps the Bill needs to be slightly more prescriptive in terms of the wider elements that are expected within this, otherwise what you are going to get is a series of pilots that start to unpack school travel around secondary children on buses and that will be it."[32]

We have been impressed by evidence that walking or cycling to school leaves children 'aerobically excited' and ready to learn when they arrive at school. Childhood obesity is rising, but walking or cycling to school offers health benefits that can equate to two hours of PE per week.[33] Existing legislation presents no barrier to the creation of innovative school travel schemes based around walking or cycling. We recommend that the Government places an expectation on all local authorities, not just pilot authorities, to promote walking and cycling to school.

Walking and cycling are also environmentally sound means of transport. If children switch to these forms of transport instead of arriving at school in private cars, this will reduce congestion and CO₂ emissions in the area around schools. Local authorities should be required to include the promotion of walking and cycling to school as part of their travel scheme proposals.

A local approach

28. The structure of pilot schemes proposed by the draft Bill allows for significant local flexibility in the implementation and management of school travel schemes. In the draft Prospectus, the Government states that in approving travel schemes, it will give weight to local needs:

"All schemes must aim to cut car use on the home to school journey. Beyond that, they must focus on local priorities and may improve provision for one or more of the list below […] This list is not exhaustive, and we recognise that there could be compelling local circumstances which suggest that an LEA should adopt different priorities. We will take a flexible approach provided applicants provide a reasoned explanation of how schemes meet local needs."[34]

29. Local authorities have for a long time lobbied for more local flexibility in the provision of home to school transport and the structure of pilots was welcomed in evidence submitted by the LGA, ATCO and others. Other witnesses expressed concern that a local approach might unfairly advantage or disadvantage one regional group of parents and pupils compared to another. Dorothy Elliott of the National Governors' Council said: "The danger with the pilots is when you have LEAs in one area operating in one way and LEAs in another area operating in another way. There has got to be some consistency."[35]

We are convinced that a more flexible and localised approach is the only sensible way to approach home to school transport. However, the Government must make clear which basic safeguards are to be retained within the pilot schemes, particularly in regard to children who live a long way from their nearest school, to those with special educational needs and to low-income families who would find it very difficult to afford transport charges. If basic entitlements to transport are to be retained on the grounds of distance, income or special educational needs, this must be clearly and explicitly written into the Bill. This would allow local authorities to conduct experimental pilot schemes whilst meeting their obligations to particularly vulnerable groups.

Funding of pilots

30. The school travel schemes approved under the terms of the draft School Transport Bill will not attract any additional funding. The Government has said it expects pilots to be cost-neutral and that better use can be made from the existing resources devoted to public transport. Giving evidence before the Transport Select Committee, the Secretary of State for Education and Skills said, "I think any authority which says, 'We have not got the money to address this problem properly', is not spending enough time thinking about how it could use its resources in a most effective way".[36] As DfES officials told us, "the evidence of successful schemes suggests there is quite a bit of mileage to get greater efficiency out of the £2 billion [of public money that is subsidising transport in local areas]".[37]

The Government's raw figure of £2 billion spent on public transport is not an accurate representation of the resources available to be spent on home to school transport. The figure includes items such as concessionary fares for the elderly and support for socially necessary evening and weekend bus services, which, if cut, could cause serious consequences and which would not be easily integrated or shared with school transport provision. We were pleased to note that the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Schools, Stephen Twigg MP, admitted as much when pressed by the Committee, saying "£650 million is much closer to the mark".[38] The Audit Commission has recently made recommendations on more effective management of the resources allocated to school transport in recent reports.[39] It may be possible to use existing transport resources more economically through integration and rationalisation, but the Government's raw figure of £2 billion is highly misleading and should not be quoted as a measure of the funding available to local authorities for school travel schemes.

31. In evidence, local authorities consistently pressed for 'pump-priming' money to be made available in connection with the school travel schemes that the draft Bill proposes to set up. The draft Prospectus states that LEAs are expected to initiate a thorough consultative process before submitting their application and to have secure monitoring and evaluation mechanisms in place. Councillor Patrick Coleman of the LGA estimated that the sums required would not be large, but would make all the difference: "we would need to set up somebody to drive this project forward, so you would be looking, I would imagine, at £100,000 to £150,000, which would enable staff to be employed on perhaps a part-time basis".[40] It is significant that the LGA, one of the most vocal supporters of the Bill, said that without the addition of initial funding, the Bill is doomed to failure, warning:

"unless there are those sort of amendments made I do not think you will see the innovation that the Government would like to see coming forward and we would like to see coming forward. The issue of pump-priming is fundamental to all of this. If the Government embraced all the changes we are putting forward and said, 'We are not going to come up with any pump-priming', unfortunately a lot of us will have wasted a lot of time."[41]

32. Under the provisions of the draft Bill, the only means by which additional revenue funding can be acquired is via the implementation of charges for transport where it was previously provided free of charge. The draft Prospectus states that local authorities may charge for transport, provided that any revenue is ploughed back into school transport. It adds that 'any charges must be affordable and pitched at a level that does not produce an increase in car journeys to school'[42] and suggests a maximum fare of £1 per child per day. The LEAs from whom we took evidence stated that they were unlikely to introduce charging in their areas.

33. The draft Bill's proposals to charge for transport where it has previously been provided free of charge in accordance with the statutory walking distances are intended to generate enough revenue to finance an improved bus service. This would attract pupils currently travelling shorter distances by car onto the bus, producing a net reduction in car use. Our evidence suggests that there is a serious question mark over this assumption. The tables in Annex A, compiled by Professor Peter White, specialist adviser to the Committee, illustrate what might happen if charges were imposed where travel is currently provided free of charge in four possible scenarios. The figures shown are not forecasts, since there is very little 'hard' data available at present on the impacts of charging, but suggest a range of outcomes. Cases A and B represent positive outcomes, but could be dependent on rather optimistic assumptions about the lack of price resistance by those now travelling free of charge, and attractiveness of improved buses to those now using cars. Some diversion from walking and cycling would also be likely to occur.

Sheena Pickersgill, Director of Corporate Services for West Yorkshire PTE, which is responsible for a 'yellow bus' scheme,[43] told us that the average cost of a seat on a yellow bus is £2.28 per child per day. This is less than the average of £3.00 per pupil per day for all mainstream pupils with statutory entitlement, although 'yellow bus' schemes also carry children over shorter distances than the minimum walking distances of two and three miles.[44] Ms Pickersgill's scheme is to be greatly expanded across West Yorkshire, supported by a substantial Government grant of £18.7 million. Compared to the large Government subsidy given to some transport schemes, the request from local authorities for £100,000 of pump-priming funding for the life of a scheme seems miserly.

34. As we have indicated, £650 million per year is currently spent on home to school transport. This is a lot of money and there may well be further advantage to be drawn from these funds through better integration and more effective management. It is to be hoped that some of the pilots schemes set up under the Bill will turn up possibilities for efficiency savings. But it is unreasonable to expect pilot schemes to function at full stretch from day one; changes in behaviour and travel mode shifts will be gradual and may occur over months or even years. Equally, money will need to be spent in the initial stages on administration, consultation and development in order for the scheme to be viable and to be approved. Further, there is a serious question mark over the extent of the revenue authorities can expect to gain from charging. Some school travel schemes will also require funding for capital investments. Capital funding for travel schemes is available to local authorities through the Local Transport Plan process and, to a lesser extent, the School Travel Plan initiative, which is limited to school site improvements. In contrast, revenue funding is severely limited and again may take months or years to emerge as take-up of the new services grows.

We believe that there is a good case for pump-priming funding to be provided in some form to school travel schemes approved under the terms of the Bill. This case is strengthened by the relative inflexibility of transport resources and the pressure placed on LEAs by the Government to pass as much as possible of their education funding directly to schools. Funding would cover the initial consultation and administration costs vital to the success of schemes. In reaching this conclusion, we concur with the findings of the Transport Select Committee and of the Education and Lifelong Learning Committee of the Welsh Assembly.[45] Evidence from all sides has shown us that the draft Bill is not currently perceived as a cost-cutting measure, but as a genuine opportunity to develop alternative approaches to home to school transport. If the Government wishes to perpetuate this perception, it should seriously consider providing funding to the schemes.

Monitoring and evaluation

35. The draft Prospectus contains one paragraph describing the proposed evaluation of school travel schemes:

"LEAs with approved schemes will be required to produce an annual report for DfES or the National Assembly as appropriate, which contains statistics on home to school travel, analysing the effect that schemes have had in reducing car use on the school run. It should contain an account of what has gone well and badly, and the views of key partners. It must also contain financial annexes, detailing the economics of schemes. DfES will commission an independent evaluation of English schemes which will draw together an analysis of each scheme, and provide evidence for the decision about whether or not to roll out the school travel scheme approach after the pilot phase ends."[46]

The process of monitoring and evaluation of school travel schemes will be vital to the success of the initiative. In order to determine the extent to which the travelling habits of pupils has changed and whether the pilot schemes can take credit for any shift, it will be necessary to take careful baseline and control measurements from the start and to perform a rigorous evaluation of the data throughout the life of the pilot. When the department comes to decide which pilot schemes are to be rolled out, it will also require a robust means of comparing different pilot schemes, which may vary significantly in their characteristics. The DfES has told us on numerous occasions that it adopts an evidence-based approach to the development of policy. The draft School Transport Bill offers an ideal opportunity for the Department to demonstrate its commitment to this approach.

It is not possible to categorise pilot schemes as successful or unsuccessful without deciding in advance what constitutes success, yet no specific targets for schemes are set in the draft Bill or its supporting material. The draft Prospectus states that all schemes must aim to 'cut car use' on the school run. This target is unhelpful: the removal of a single car from the road would technically fulfil this criterion, yet few would judge this a successful result. This imprecision also makes local authorities' task of preparing applications for pilot schemes harder than it need be.

Cabinet Office guidance states that policy should be SMART—specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-dependent—providing a clear picture of the problem to be overcome, facilitating the identification of options for delivery and establishing the success or failure of the selected option.[47] We have not detected any SMART targets associated with the draft School Transport Bill. Clearly, the specific numerical targets for school travel schemes will vary significantly in different local authorities. One way to deal with this is through the adoption of relative targets (e.g. a 20% reduction in the number of children travelling to school by car within three years, or a 5% reduction in CO₂ emissions near schools) agreed against a baseline date and measurement. We would urge the Department to consider the viability of setting targets for the evaluation of school travel schemes using relative measures, such as a percentage decrease in congestion near schools or in the number of children travelling to school by car.

36. The draft Prospectus provides a list of possible benefits against which travel schemes might be measured. These include an improvement in the provision of transport to denominational or Welsh-language schools, the use of modern technology in route-planning, innovative purchasing arrangements and expanded post-16 provision. We believe that successful school travel schemes could bring great benefits in terms of environmental improvements, social interaction, educational opportunities through curriculum enrichment and health and fitness. Transport will also have a vital part to play in the development of the extended school day. Government policy sees the school as a centre for the community through initiatives such as the 'extended school' programme. This will mean that schools increasingly open their facilities to the wider community, offering extracurricular activities at the beginning and end of the traditional school day, for which transport must be made available.

In the light of the wide range of potential benefits to be gained from improved home to school transport, the stated prime criterion of reducing car use seems too narrow in scope. Although many of these factors are difficult to measure, the challenge of defining an assessment framework should not deter the Government from undertaking a full and exhaustive evaluation of the effect of pilot schemes and disseminating its findings as widely as possible in order that others may learn from the experiences of pilot authorities. This may well require cross-departmental co-operation in order to draw in expertise from a number of different areas.

Monitoring and evaluation of pilot schemes must be particularly alert to unintended consequences, which may affect especially vulnerable groups such as disabled pupils or pupils with special educational needs. Officials from the DfES and the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Schools told us that these criteria would be taken into account when assessing pilot schemes, yet this is not clearly stated in the draft Bill. School travel schemes should be required to measure their impact on low income families and on disabled pupils and pupils with special educational needs. This requirement should be explicitly spelt out on in the Bill's Prospectus and in guidance given to LEAs.

37. The DfES has suggested that monitoring and evaluation exercises could be carried out in the classroom as part of the school curriculum. This suggestion has not been universally welcomed. Martin Ward of the Secondary Heads Association commented, "As this Committee well knows schools have innumerable duties placed on them and to be at the beck and call of yet another set of enthusiasts, which is essentially what the situation appears to be here, is simply a step too far for schools."[48] We too are cautious about imposing another requirement on schools, but for those schools that perceive a value in undertaking this activity, such exercises could enrich the teaching of subjects such as numeracy and citizenship.

38. The issue of evaluation and monitoring is clearly an area where the draft Bill needs further work. Evaluation criteria and monitoring techniques must be carefully thought through. Mr Twigg told us that he recognised this deficiency, saying "We need to do further work as to exactly what the nature of that evaluation will be. We need to sit down pilot authority by pilot authority to get some shared objectives."[49] He went on to describe the possibility of collecting data through the Pupil-Level Annual School Census (PLASC):

"…this will enable us to ask pupils as part of that census: How do you usually come to school? and to have what will be a very accurate figure one year that we can compare with the figure the next year and the year after. If we can get that up and running in all of the pilot authorities, or at least some of them, we will have a very, very clear basis for making an evaluation."[50]

The use of PLASC may be one way to ensure reliable and continuous monitoring of pilot schemes, but this proposition is not mentioned in the draft Bill or its accompanying documents.

39. The draft Bill is vague on the details of monitoring and evaluation and does not make clear who will be responsible for carrying out assessments effectively. It does not set clear targets for pilot schemes and fails to set targets in areas other than congestion. Improved home to school transport could bring benefits in a number of areas, for example:

Health: combating childhood obesity and encouraging exercise habits that will last a lifetime.
Environmental impact: reducing harmful emissions near school and taking congestion away from the school gates.
Curriculum enrichment: improved transport provision could facilitate field trips, out-of-school and after-school activities. If the Government wishes to pursue a policy of school diversity, enhanced transport provision will be necessary in order to make parental preference a reality for more families. This may result in an increase in mobility and hence in the distance pupils travel to school.

The draft Bill is a missed opportunity to promote policy across these areas.

The Government must first decide exactly what it is attempting to achieve by means of the draft Bill and then establish a rigorous monitoring and evaluation framework to assess the effectiveness of pilot schemes in achieving those objectives. Schemes that begin without proper monitoring systems in place will not produce reliable results and will jeopardise the credibility of the project as a whole.

The Draft Regulatory Impact Assessment

The draft Partial Regulatory Impact Assessment is a significant weakness of the draft Bill as it stands. The purpose of a Regulatory Impact Assessment (RIA) is to provide "an assessment of the impact of policy options in terms of the costs, benefits and risks of a proposal".[51] A partial RIA should have worked-up options, developed thinking on compliance and monitoring and refined cost and benefit estimates[52] The .draft School Transport Bill's Partial RIA does not fulfil this function and does not currently provide an adequate basis for pre-legislative scrutiny.

40. The draft Partial RIA outlines the risks of the present state of home to school transport in terms of increasing congestion, environmental damage and poor provision. It does not assess the risks inherent to the new structure proposed by the draft Bill or set out strategies to manage those risks. Risks to the success of the school transport proposals include: a lack of quality applications from LEAs; a lack of tenders from commercial bus operators; the possibility of joint applications from two or more LEAs being submitted where only one LEA is deemed suitable for approval; the applications submitted not covering the range of geographic, socio-economic or socially excluded groups the department wishes to target; the failure of pilots to run within existing school transport budgets.

41. The draft Partial RIA does not justify the Government's proposals on home to school transport or detail the evidence behind them. In particular, there is a lack of supporting evidence for the assumption the pilot schemes can be funded out of existing LEA transport budgets, which underpins the Department's approach; a lack of clearly defined and measurable objectives for the legislation; a restricted consideration of alternative options to the draft legislation (two alternative options are mentioned: doing nothing or deregulating entirely: there is no justification of the decision to run pilots in twenty areas rather than ten or thirty); and there is no quantified demonstration that the benefits of the preferred option outweigh the costs. The potential effects of unintended consequences such as moving congestion hot-spots to another location or shifting children who currently walk or cycle onto the bus are not fully explored and a monitoring and evaluation framework is not clearly identified.

There is much work to be done to produce a robust final Regulatory Impact Assessment that will accompany any School Transport Bill presented to Parliament. As Cabinet Office guidance indicates, RIAs should not be considered a mere formality, but should provide a thorough cost-benefit analysis of the Bill's proposals and an assessment of any risks to the effectiveness of its provisions.

Timescale

42. The draft Prospectus states that "as many schemes as possible will start in September 2006, running until the end of July 2010, or a later agreed date. Others may apply for approval to run schemes from September 2007 if there are fewer than 20 applications approved in the first round […] DfES and the Welsh Assembly Government will separately evaluate schemes and separately decide by 31 July 2011 whether or not the local scheme approach should continue and/or be extended to more LEAs. If either DfES or the Welsh Assembly decides to return to the old regime, scheme authorities will be able to terminate their schemes over a period of time by mutual agreement."[53]

School travel schemes must be given sufficient time to prove their worth. Short term changes in behaviour may not be sustained over the school year or over successive school years as parents' school choice is influenced by the nature of the transport provision that is available. 2011 seems a very long time to wait for a solution to be found to school transport that can be implemented nationwide. We therefore recommend that the Department looks into the possibility of running shorter pilot schemes or of evaluating currently existing initiatives to determine what works best. This Committee has heard of much good practice that could already be spread more widely.

Powers to repeal or extend

43. The draft Explanatory Notes set out the powers of the Secretary of State in relation to school travel schemes. The draft Bill

"gives power to the Secretary of State and National Assembly to provide by order that the new provisions will cease to have effect in England or Wales, as the case may be. Such an order may contain transitional provisions and, if made by the Secretary of State, is subject to affirmative resolution. Subsection (3) provides that the earliest date on which the new provisions could cease to have effect under such an order is 1 August 2011.

It is envisaged that an order under this clause would be made if, as a result of the piloting of the new provisions under clause 2, the effects of the new provisions are not considered a success. If an order is not made the new provisions will continue after the pilot is completed and there will then be no limit on the number of participating LEAs."[54]

This effectively means that in 2011 the pilot schemes will be reviewed by the Secretary of State and by the National Assembly, who will decide which schemes, if any, have been a success. This decision to repeal or to roll out schemes will be implemented via secondary legislation.

44. In its report on School Transport, the Transport Select Committee concluded:

"In effect, the Secretary of State for Education in England and the National Assembly in Wales would have power to determine the way in which school transport should be provided, without any further report on the success of schemes, or sanction by Parliament. This is not acceptable."[55]

We share the unease of the Transport Select Committee in regard to the nature of the powers that the draft Bill confers to the Secretary of State. The wording of the Bill does not make clear how the rollout will be effectuated and the effect on local authorities who have not participated in the pilot programme. The conclusion and evaluation of the school travel schemes should be the occasion for a report to Parliament.

28 Paragraphs 5 and 6. Back

29 The term 'walking bus' denotes a scheme where children walk to school in a group accompanied by an adult along a designated route, picking up pupils along the way. Back

30 Qq 111, 112. Back

31 Draft Prospectus, paragraph 7. Back

32 Q 120 Back

33 Mackett R L, Lucas L, Paskins J andTurbin J (2004) 'Cities for children: the effects of car use on their lives', Proceedings of the Walk 21-V Cities for People Conference, Copenhagen, Denmark, 9-11 June 2004. Back

34 Paragraph 8. Back

35 Q 202 Back

36 Q 212 Back

37 Q 8 Back

38 Q 474 Back

39 Going Places: Taking People to and from Education, Social Services and Health Care, The Audit Commission, November 2001. Back