Contact: Terry Rath, tel: 01962 846457 e-mail [email protected]

1 Summary

1.1 This report sets out the legal background, County Council policy and current pressures on the home to school transport budget. It proposes consultation on the continuation of free transport to denominational schools after September 2007. Details of the number of pupils assisted with transport to denominational schools in 2004/5 and the costs are set out in an Appendix to this report. A report on the consultations will be brought back to the Policy and Review Committee for their consideration and advice in May 2006.

1.2 This proposal supports Aim 5 of the Corporate Strategy, improving services by focusing resources on priorities for the Children's Services Department and in doing so contributes to all the Children Act outcomes.

2 Legal Background

2.1 The County Council is required to make such arrangements for the provision of transport to school as it considers necessary for the purpose of facilitating the attendance at school of children of compulsory school age. The requirements are set out in Sections 509 and 444 of the Education Act 1996.

2.2 This duty has been interpreted by the courts to mean that the County Council's transport arrangements must ensure that no parent can have a defence to a prosecution for the non-attendance of their child. One of the defences available to parents is that the County Council has not made suitable arrangements for a child's transport to and from school where the child's home is not within the walking distance of the school, or they have not enabled him to become a regular pupil at a school nearer to his home. The walking distances are set out in Section 444 of the Education Act 1996 and are two miles for pupils aged up to 8 years and three miles for those aged over 8 years. The distances are measured by the nearest available route.

2.3 Where the County Council considers it necessary to provide transport to facilitate a child's attendance in such circumstances, that transport must be provided free of charge. Where the County Council does not consider it necessary to make arrangements to, in effect, secure the attendance of the child, it has discretion to pay the whole or any part of the reasonable travelling expense of a particular pupil.

2.4 However, in determining the arrangements they make in relation to a particular child, the County Council must have regard, amongst other things, to any wish of that child's parents for him or her to be provided with education at a school at which the religious education provided is that of the religion or denomination to which his or her parent adheres.

2.5 For most children attending denominational schools, transport is therefore discretionary and made under the provisions of the Education Act 1996. The Council may pay the whole or any part of transport costs. In 2002, when the East Riding County Council decided to charge pupils for attending denominational schools, the legality of the decision was initially challenged by the DfES. However, the DfES then wrote "the requirement for local authorities to have regard to the religious convictions of a child's parents does not mean that this is an overriding factor in the local authority's deliberations" and "it is lawful for LEAs to take into account the cost of providing transport and their own resources when deciding whether to end free denominational transport".

2.6 Information is being gathered about the number of local authorities who have ceased to provide free transport to denominational schools or who are actively considering withdrawing or amending this provision.

3. Current Policy

3.1 Hampshire policy is to provide assistance with denominational transport to pupils who live:

· More than 2 miles but less than 6 miles from their nearest appropriate denominational school if the pupil is 8 years or less;

· More than 3 miles but less than 6 miles from their nearest appropriate denominational school if the pupil is aged between 8 and 11;

· More than 3 miles but less than 10 miles from their nearest appropriate denominational school if the pupils are aged 11-16.

3.2 In the past, the Education Committee approved some specific exceptions to this policy where unusual circumstances justified doing so:

(i) The outer distance (10 miles) limit for boys and girls attending either St George's or St Anne's secondary schools in Southampton is calculated from the nearer of the two schools so that boys and girls living in the same families receive the same opportunities. This means there is enhanced opportunities for girls living, for example, in parts of Winchester and for boys living in parts of the Waterside.

(ii) While only the northern part of Hayling Island lies within the 6 miles of Sir Thomas More's School in Havant, assistance is available to children on the whole of the island, given that there is no question of access in any direction other than the north.

(iii) In Gosport and the Waterside, measuring distances via ferry routes brings children within the 10 mile distance for secondary schools, and assistance is given in these cases.

3.3 In addition, pupils are expected to meet a denominational test, ie that they have been baptised or otherwise received into the faith of the denomination of the school. This is used as a way of meeting the requirements of the Education Act 1996 that denominational transport can be provided to meet the religion or denomination to which the parent adheres.

4. Expenditure 2004/5 and Provision

4.1 It is Hampshire's practice to provide season tickets for all entitled pupils or, if there is no suitable public bus or rail service, then to provide the school governors or local parish a season ticket equivalent sum to allow them to arrange their own transport. In general, the secondary age pupils receive season tickets and primary pupils use school/parish organised transport funded by the County Council. As a result the impact of changing existing arrangements will impact differentially between primary and secondary pupils. This will be discussed in more detail later in this report.

4.2 During the financial year 2004/5 £564,332 was spent on transporting 1374 pupils at an average unit cost of £411. The vast majority of pupils (1251) were provided with transport assistance to ten secondary schools at a cost of £511,603, leaving 123 pupils to receive assistance with transport to 15 primary schools at a cost of £52,229. The unit cost for secondary pupils is £409 and for primary pupils £429.

4.3 Of the 25 schools receiving pupils for whom transport is supported by the County Council, 22 are Roman Catholic and 3 Anglican. Of the schools, twelve are maintained by Hampshire and thirteen by neighbouring local authorities. This pattern of distribution will mean that consultation with neighbouring authorities will need to be undertaken in view of the potential impact of any policy changes on the number of pupils attending the schools in their areas.

4.4 Unlike the Roman Catholic aided primary schools, the majority of Church of England aided schools are situated in rural areas and pupils entitled to transport receive it under the normal policy because the school is either their nearest or catchment area school. There are no Church of England aided secondary schools in Hampshire.

5. Reasons for Consultation

5.1 There are grounds in equity in looking at the impact of the current denominational transport policy. It provides potential support with transport costs for Roman Catholic and Anglican parents living in some but not all parts of Hampshire. As there are only Anglican or Roman Catholic schools within Hampshire this support with transport costs is not available to those from other Christian denominations or from other faiths. Even for Anglicans and Roman Catholic current policy means that in large parts of the county the distance limits remove support with transport costs. For example, at secondary level transport assistance for Anglicans wanting a denominational school for their children is largely restricted to those living close to the West Sussex border. For Roman Catholics, assistance with transport is not available to those living in Alton, Andover, Borden (part), Petersfield, part of Waterside, to the north, east and west of the Winchester city boundary and Yateley (part). It is clear that current policy affects children differently. In practice, some children travel to denominational schools without County Council assistance while others do not attend denominational schools but might have done so with assistance.

5.2 Denomination transport is the major area where the County Council continues to provide discretionary assistance for home to school transport. Provision to mainstream and special schools is already based upon the statutory maximum walking distances. Another report on the agenda for the meeting of this committee indicates that the home to school transport budget is likely to overspend this year by some £300,000. This is despite the County Council undertaking a range of Spent to Save initiatives over the past four years which has been very successful in mitigating the impact of inflationary pressures but not removing them. New initiatives have been agreed but their impact will be less as the best opportunities have been taken. This leaves policy adjustment as a way to further contain budgetary pressures.

5.3 There have been growing concerns about the potential conflict between this provision and the Human Rights Act. It is clear that education legislation allows local authorities to have regard to parental preferences in providing transport for denominational education. It does mean that some families will be assisted with transport to their children's school on denomination grounds, but parents with preference for other schools for other reasons do not receive assistance with transport costs. For example, parents do not receive assistance with transport if they decide to send their child to a specialist secondary school, if it is not their nearest or catchment area school, even though it is the nearest school with the specialism to their home address. The strict denominational limitations in the current policy and the lack of transport assistance available to parents when they have chosen schools for their children for other than denominational reasons has led to a number of Ombudsman cases in which the Human Rights legislation has been used by parents to support their case. So far, the Ombudsman has not supported their arguments. At the moment, the DfES takes the view that any conflict between education legislation and the Human Rights Act will have to be resolved in the courts, although the new Education Act based on the recent White Paper may attempt to clarify these issues.

6. Timing of any Changes and Financial Impact

6.1 The Education (School Information) (England) Regulations 2002 require local authorities to produce a prospectus every year and include within it information about home to school transport. The regulations also prescribe the time and manner of publication of that information. Section 9(1) states that "a composite prospectus shall be published annually and before 1 October in each publication year and in any event no later than six weeks before the date up to which parents may express a preference". In practice, this means that a local authority must determine and publish it's home to school transport policy over a year before it is due to take effect. Any amendments on the existing home to school transport policy, following consultation, will therefore have to be implemented from September 2007.

6.2 As most of the pupils receiving support with transport to denominational schools have season tickets provided, it is more straightforward to estimate the financial impact of any changes than when pupils are, for example, withdrawn from a contract bus which still needs to operate but carrying fewer pupils. The subsidy to parishes/governing bodies also provided is based on the number of entitled pupils carried. Changes to the level of subsidy could impact on the ability of parishes/governors to continue to provide transport.

6.3 As there is little variation between the size of the year group being transported to denominational schools, it can be reasonably assumed that c£110,000 in a full financial year could be saved by stopping the provision of transport for pupils normally entering either Year 1 for primary schools or Year 7 for secondary schools. The part year effect would be a saving of c£70,000. The impact of these savings would be to reduce the budget of £560,000 over six financial years as set out below:

6.4 An alternative approach could be to limit the level of support provided by introducing charges for new entrants to school from September 2007. If a charge of £1 per day were to be introduced it would produce an income of c£48,500 in a full financial year after having reduced the number by the county average of pupils entitled to free school meals in the primary and secondary sectors. The impact on the budget of introducing charges at this level would be to reduce the budget of £560,000 over six financial years as set out below.

It is estimated that by introducing charging the County Council's overall budget commitment to providing assistance with denominational transport would be reduced by c£250,000 per year by the time the policy is fully implemented leaving a budget commitment of some £310,000.

6.5 Another approach that might be adopted would be to sustain support only for those children in receipt of free school meals. This would mirror the approach the Government is proposing in the recent White Paper to extend choice to parents of the least well off. In this proposal the County Council, despite it's budget pressures would be sustaining denominational choice for this group of parents. In 2005, 9% of primary age pupils and 7% secondary age pupils were entitled to free school meals. This would mean that some 20 children per year would be entitled to home to school transport, if this approach were to be adopted, at an annual cost of some £8,200. At the end of the six year period from the introduction of this approach the County Council will be meeting denomination transport costs of some £45,000.

7. Consultation

7.1 It is proposed that the County Council consult all interested parties, including parents, school governors, diocese and neighbouring local authorities on the following proposals:

(i) to cease to provide support for denominational transport to new entrants to school from September 2007;

(ii) to charge all new entrants from September 2007 entitled under existing policy the equivalent of £1 per day for transport to denominational schools except those in receipt of free school meals;

(iii) from September 2007 to provide assistance with transport only to those new entrants entitled under existing policy but also in receipt of free schools meals; and

(iv) to continue the existing policy.

7.2 A report on the consultation will be brought to the Policy Review Committee on 23 May 2006.

8. Legal Implications

These are covered in the body of this report.

9. Financial Implications

These are covered in the body of this report.

10. Personnel Implications

None.

11. Impact Assessment

Proposals in this report will have an impact on some residents of Hampshire. The details are explored in the report.

12. Crime Prevention Issues

No issues have been identified.

13. Views of the local County Councillor

The proposals in this report have county wide implications.

Recommendation

The Policy Review Committee advise the Executive Member for Education on the proposed consultation outlined in paragraph 7.1 of this report.

Section 100 D - Local Government Act 1972 - background documents

The following documents discuss facts or matters on which this report, or an important part of it, is based and have been relied upon to a material extent in the preparation of this report.

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1. Published works

2. Documents which disclose exempt or confidential information as defined in the Act.

List documents here or type `none'.