House of Commons - Education and Skills

Select Committee on Education and Skills Memoranda

Memorandum submitted by the Local Government Association school transport working Group-Draft Bill and Prospectus (ST 02)

LOCAL GOVERNMENT ASSOCIATION

1. The Local Government Association (LGA) was formed on 1 April 1997 and represents the local authorities of England and Wales—a total of just under 500 authorities. These local authorities represent over 50 million people and spend around £65 billion pounds per annum. The LGA exists to promote better local government. We work with and for our member authorities to realise a shared vision of local government that enables local people to shape a distinctive and better future for their locality and its communities. The LGA aims to put local councils at the heart of the drive to improve public services and to work with government to ensure that the policy, legislative and financial context in which they operate, supports that objective.

BACKGROUND

2. In June last year, the LGA began its own review of home to school transport leading to the publication Children on the move -accessing excellence: the future of school travel in September 2003. A joint working party of elected members from the Education & Lifelong Learning and Transport Executives developed[1], in consultation with local authority officers and many others, a series of recommendations and actions for both central and local government.

3. There were a number of issues local authorities were bringing to the LGA's attention which prompted our review, including:

(a) Recent education policy developments contributing to the pressure on transport for pupils eg specialist secondary schools, transforming the 14-19 curriculum and the emphasis on full-time education for excluded pupils.

(b) The increasing use of cars to take children to school creating congestion and pollution and delaying other road users.

(c) Pressures in the system resulting in increased costs of provision which, particularly in rural areas, was taking an increasing share of the local authority education budget not allocated to schools.

4. The LGA welcomes the draft School Transport Bill which gives due consideration to the complexities of the issue and its consequences and underlines the importance of local solutions to local problems. The existing legislation governing home to school transport no longer matches the education service of today. Local authorities need greater legislative flexibility to respond to today's pressures and developments.

LGA RESPONSE TO DRAFT SCHOOL TRANSPORT BILL

5. LGA were pleased to note that the draft bill and prospectus has taken into consideration many of the points we made in Children on the move.

6. The main point LGA welcome is the fact that six to 12 pilots, covering up to 20 LEAs in England and six areas in Wales, will be given the freedom to trial new approaches to school transport, adopting schemes tailored to their locality which address local priorities. The decision to trial new models of provision at LEA level is particularly welcomed by the LGA who have consistently argued that the problems facing different parts of the country are complex and varied, and solutions should be tailored to fit local need. Measures in the draft bill are consistent with the LGA's lobbying positions

7. Although it is an issue that must be handled with thorough consultation taking account of the importance of social inclusion, charging as deemed appropriate by individual authorities, is a welcomed move. The LGA report Children on the move reported that there is widespread agreement regarding the current requirement to provide free transport for children living a particular distance from school, and the sharp dividing line between free and full cost provision, no longer can be justified in terms of equity, efficiency or need. This move however has political implications, with councils being at the receiving end of much of the flak.

8. LGA also welcomes the Government's support in giving local authorities freedom to trial staggering of school opening hours introduced through collaboration with schools. This could be through a reserve power for local authorities to change school times so that they can be linked into school and local authority travel plans. Again this is an issue that needs to be handled sensitively. Schools collaboration and the collective working of schools, particularly in local communities, is an aspect of the wider children's agenda which the LGA is working on.

9. Some points the LGA have been promoting remain unaddressed. They remain unaddressed for a variety of reasons—they fall under the remit of another department, spending review timeline—however, we will continue to voice the needs and concerns of member authorities during and after the consultation period.

10. As yet there are no guarantees to fund pilots this side of the spending review.[2] The LGA will be lobbying for provision of pump-priming funds for the pilot authorities to allow them to develop new arrangements.[3] The LGA challenges any assumption that implementation of the measures in the draft Bill are cost-neutral, particularly in the early stages of a pilot when start up costs will be an issue for authorities. Upfront costs such as consultation, research and analytical work and setting up new systems could warrant substantial resources across the board. Coupled with controversy over charging, the lack of funding provision may act as a disincentive to some authorities. The LGA welcomes the Transport Select Committee Report published on 7 April 2004, which states that "if the Government wishes the pilot schemes to be tested properly, it must bear some of the costs of developing its new policy[4]".

11. The LGA asked central government to grant local authorities access to information about eligibility for certain benefits, which has not been mentioned in the draft Bill. We hope government will pursue, as promised, a way for all authorities to address this through a change in the law/regulations, possibly through an Education bill in 2005. Access to information about eligibility for certain benefits will speed up processes that can be time-consuming with associated administrative costs.

12. The LGA has highlighted the need for changes to Transport Acts' (1985 and 2000) restrictive framework around competition and quality partnership provisions. Authorities need to have greater flexibility to work with providers to create the necessary transport services.[5] This includes; the ability to create seats for sale on "education contracts" without registering as a registered service route; allowing local authorities to conduct post tender negotiations and; allowing local authorities to enter into local bus contracts of more than five years. We understand that changes are being considered via regulatory reform order, under the remit of the DfT and urge for this to happen.[6]

13. The £2 billion figure often used to quantify public spending on transport for the purpose of encouraging efficiencies in the school transport context includes some sums that cannot be readily combined into one funding stream, for example concessionary fares schemes for the elderly. The DfT has been considering the complexity of bus subsidy mechanisms for some time. The revenue support and subsidy given to: "mainstream" tendered services, bus challenge schemes, dedicated school contracts, and social services transport may benefit with greater integration, but questions arise concerning a combined funding route (ie via DfEs or DfT). As stated in the Transport Committee report (page 5), school transport's share of the pie is £600 million with local authority spending on provision rising in excess of the rate of inflation.

14. The LGA will be lobbying to allow pilot authorities, if they wish, to not provide transport to pupils who are behaving in a manner that may cause injury or damage to other passengers or road users from local authority services. This is not a feature in the Bill. The Transport Committee's findings highlight that supervision of school children on public transport could be a possible solution to this (page 12). We would welcome further thought on how poor behaviour by pupils could be tackled.

15. Children on the move recommended that the current link to provide transport with school attendance should be broken ie a lack of free transport would no longer be a legal defence for non-attendance. However, we would expect local authorities' transport policies to continue to assist parents in securing their child's attendance at school.

DFES SCHOOL TRAVEL SCHEMES—DRAFT BILL AND PROSPECTUS RESPONSE FROM LGA HOME TO SCHOOL TRANSPORT WORKING GROUP

1. Do you agree that the existing school transport legislation, which assumes that it is reasonable for pupils to walk three miles to school (two miles for under 8s), accompanied if necessary by their parents, is outdated, and contributes to increasing levels of car use?

— Yes the legislation is outdated and contributes towards increased levels of car use. However, it must be acknowledged that there are likely to be other factors involved in a parent's decision to use their car. Changes to school transport legislation in isolation may not lead to a reduction in car use.

2. Do you agree that any new school travel schemes should be based on an assessment of the travel needs of all pupils in a local travel scheme area (from nursery to age 16)?

— Ideally schemes should be as wide as possible to look for economies of scale and to tie together pieces of work into coherent units. Whilst recognising that nursery education is not statutory provision, the recent change in legislation to provide free part-time early years education for children from the age of three should be taken into account when developing new school travel schemes as practical problems arise.

3. Do you agree that in drawing up school travel schemes LEAs should have the widest possible discretion to make appropriate travel arrangements?

— Yes. One of the main problems with the current system is the fact that it restricts authorities' options in terms of identifying possible creative solutions.

— LGA were delighted to learn that the Transport Committee (whom we gave oral evidence to in February 2004) voiced the same concerns regarding the current restrictive framework that exists under the Transport Act 1985 (see page 15 of Transport Committee Report)).

4. Are the proposed scheme objectives (see page 4, paras 7 and 8) drawn widely enough? (Page 4 is blank. Should the question refer to page 6?)

— The objectives are reasonably wide and admit that it is not an exhaustive list but do suggest a few possible areas to look at. It is hoped, however, that the "flexible approach" referred to will be exactly that and priority is not given based solely on the suggested areas highlighted.

5. Do you accept the principle that affordable fares could be charged if this secured more comprehensive and higher quality school transport provision?

— Yes, we do accept the principle that "affordable fares" could be charged if the wider community can see the benefit of it. For instance, the wider benefit could be of having an integrated transport network where pupils can use public transport outside of school hours to access extra curricular activities.

— Securing higher quality school transport provision is not an easy task but many authorities must move towards something better than which currently exists. Although the local authority will always subsidise provision, due consideration must be given to the issues surrounding this.

— The LGA believe that local authorities should self determine what an "affordable fare" is, taking account of local circumstances, eg travel distances, cost of living, and cost of transport.

6. Are the proposals relating to charging fair, in that they protect children from low income families who attend their nearest suitable school from paying fares? Should the legislation or individual scheme authorities do more to protect vulnerable groups?

— Although one could agree with the principle of protection for vulnerable groups, there are at least two issues associated with this. The first again is the funding of schemes. The greater the number of pupils who are exempt from charges then either; the greater the deficit between costs and income or; the greater the amount pupils who are not exempt from the charges will have to pay.

— The second issue is that, whereas at present the transport legislation results in a distance-based lottery where some people qualify and others don't, we will simply move to an income-based lottery. Whatever the income limit used there will be pupils who just qualify and others that are just outside the limit for help.

— Payment linked to income however is considered to be fairer than non-payment linked to distance.

— The word "suitable" should not be used in conjunction with "designated or nearest school". With increased emphasis on inclusion, the working assumption must surely be that, unless a child has particular specialist needs, the nearest school is, by default, suitable to meet their educational needs.

— It should up to the local authority to consider the level of resources beyond the minimum they can provide and they will always have to show that procedures exist to take individual circumstances into account.

7. Should there be protection for children who have been unable to gain a place at a school within walking distance from home, where they are sent to a school that their parents did not choose some distance away?

— We would appreciate greater clarification of "protection"' as we are unclear whether it refers to the provision of "free public transport" or "access to public transport".

— If pupils are over the qualifying distance then they receive help with transport to whichever school becomes their "nearest" school with spaces. Any change to this policy would be reducing current provision.

8. Should any compulsory school age pupils educated full time at FE colleges or otherwise outside school be treated in the same way as pupils of compulsory school age registered at school, or are their needs best met through a locally tailored package of support?

— There will always be some pupils for whom a tailored package of support is more appropriate to their individual learning needs, particularly in a rural county where the one size fits all approach will be unsuitable.

9. Are the proposals for the core minimum provision (ie for children of compulsory school age who live beyond walking distance from the nearest suitable school at which places were available) fair?

— Yes. The idea of the Bill should be to extend provision and if the current core minimum provision is not retained then this could lead again to the service provided being below the current standard, which would be against the principles of the scheme.

— A core minimum provision should also work towards reducing car use.

10. Should schemes also make provision (possibly on a fare paying basis) for transport to denominational schools or Welsh medium schools, even when they are not the nearest, provided the distances pupils travel and the cost of provision are reasonable?

— Yes. This is possible, and indeed is being done, under the current legislation. It is also a matter of contentiousness that hinges upon the demographic and geographical profile of an authority. Authorities need to consider the legal consequences of non-provision of transport, to denominational schools, as outlined in the ECHR and other domestic equalities legislation.

11. Does the prospectus do enough to ensure that there is good integration between school travel schemes and post-16 transport policy statements?

— No. There is only one reference under local consultation to post-16 policy statements and partnerships, and there must be integration of these two areas to achieve real benefits, along with many other areas such as public transport, social services and health transport.

12. Are the proposed scheme start dates (September 2006 or 2007), end date of pilot period (2010) and evaluation timetable (2011) reasonable?

— If effective consultation is to take place with all partners concerned, the timetable is reasonable. The tightest timetable might be the evaluation period depending on the complexity of any agreed schemes. In addition the approval date of November 2005 is too late to include information in secondary transfer booklets, which in some authorities need to be finalised in July for printing in August and distribution in September. Application forms need to be returned by mid-November for pupils transferring school in the following September.

— However, in support of the Transport Committee's findings, if the Bill is passed next year, pilots which are able to provide robust results on improved services should be suitable for widespread application where felt appropriate locally.

13. Do the proposed changes to transport legislation address the concerns of LEAs wishing to run local travel schemes?

— No. Legislative change is needed for local authorities to be able provide transport and charge without contracts having to be registered under the 85 Transport Act. As schemes are developed other issues may come to light and there needs to be a mechanism for further amendments if necessary.

— The question differentiates LEAs from LTAs (local transport authorities) although these are effectively the same bodies. Question 17 below leads towards consideration of more integration between council departments.

14. Are any further legislative changes needed to give LEAs the freedom they need to run innovative local travel schemes?

— Please see points 8 to14 on pages three and four of this submission.

— Further to point 14, local authorities would welcome further guidelines on circumstances where pupils may be refused access to using school transport where there is a history of persistent bad behaviour and/or, abuse such as vandalism. Consideration would, of course, need to be given to the impact of such a sanction of pupils of families on low incomes, especially in areas where there is no alternative transport provision.

— As above and question 17. It may be that innovative local travel schemes should be a "partnership" between the LEA and the LTA roles of authorities, in which case transport legislation could usefully be amended (see Q 17).

15. Does the draft prospectus provide sufficiently clear and appropriate guidance for LEAs putting together applications to become scheme authorities? Are the evaluation criteria clear and appropriate?

— No, but this may be appropriate. If the idea is to look at local schemes to solve local problems rather than a one scheme fits all approach then each bid should be assessed on its own merits.

— The evaluation criteria are unclear. Ideally these should be agreed as part of the granting of pilot status so that processes can be in place to monitor and evaluate the scheme before it starts.

— We would also welcome clarification on the definition of "protection"' (see Q 7).

16. Please comment on the application form (is it clear, is the content right, is it easy to complete, is the application timetable achievable and matched to other related dates (eg local transport plan applications, schools admissions round))?

— We were not able to see whether applicants could indicate a start date of either 2006-07. Is this an option?

— The next full Local Transport Plans need to be submitted in July 2005 and transport authorities are now giving preliminary consideration to the contents of these plans. The timing of the draft Bill would thus appear to be good, insofar as potential draft Bill applications can be considered in parallel with LTP drafting. However, revenue funding is difficult in transport service delivery as in education, and there are severe inflationary pressures on bus revenue support, so it is probably unlikely that authorities will be able to find substantive funding for home to school transport experiments emerging under this Bill from LTP funding sources (which are mainly capital based).

— The application form appears to ask for some duplicate information. B1 asks for ". . .travel patterns." But so does the second question under B2. In general the questions are not numbered in each section and this is confusing when referring to a question. Questions D1 and D3 are similar and I think that D3 should come first, followed by D1 and then D2. D2 isn't clear about whether it refers to the pilot area only. Also D5 could be covered as of part D1 in the prospectus.

17. What more could government do to encourage better integration in local transport scheme areas between all types of publicly funded transport, to achieve better value for the more than £2 billion which is spent annually in England and Wales on publicly funded transport?

— See point 12 and 13 in this submission (page 3 and 4).

— The draft Bill does not allow the degree of local authority influence on the subsidised publicly accessible bus network that would be required to ensure that there is an effective "quality network" serving the full range of local needs. The Bill could be amended to ensure that more of the restrictive provisions in the Transport Act 1985 and Transport Act 2000 are lifted in experimental areas to facilitate further integration.

— Some hold the view that there are great inefficiencies going on. Although there may be some savings to be made, transport is an expensive provision and this needs to be recognised. A greater problem is the limited number of providers in some areas, which results in monopoly or near-monopoly situations and higher prices. This would be an area for good practice guidance rather than central legislation that could stifle local solutions to local problems.

18. Is it necessary for the Secretary of State and the National Assembly to have the power to direct LEAs to revoke or amend aspects of their travel schemes, once approved?

— No. The local authority should take the decision to undo it, anything otherwise is too centralised control.

19. Are you content for this Bill to provide both for pilot schemes, and for the local travel scheme approach to be rolled out to more LEAs on a permanent basis, without further primary legislation, if it is a success?

— No. We would echo the Transport Committee's views on this (see page 19 of their report) and urge the Education and Skills Committee to look at this issue further.

20. Any further comments?

— We would welcome a greater emphasis on the link between school travel pilots and school travel plans which currently exist, and the success of school travel advisers.

Membership of the Home to School Transport Working Group

(joint members from transport and education executives)

Cllr Tony Page, Reading (Labour)

Cllr Ramon Wilkinson, Cambridgeshire (Consv)

Clrl Don Rule, Herefordshire (Indp)

Baroness Ros Scott, Suffolk (LD)

Cllr Patrick Coleman, Wiltshire (LD)

Cllr Malcolm Blanksby, Wycombe (Indp)

Cllr Jim Harker, Northamptonshire (Consv)

Cllr Saxon Spence, Devon (Labour)

Rohati Chapman, LGA, ESP

Vince Christie, LGA, EEP