School Transport
Item 3 relates to school transport. I have circulated a letter, which was previously considered by the committee, on the guidance on school transport, and a response to the letter that we wrote to the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities on the subject.
Minister, would you like to make some opening remarks?
I do not think so. There has been an exchange of correspondence and I have seen the recent correspondence from COSLA. I am here to try to answer any questions that the committee might have.
Will the Executive consider monitoring local authorities' performance in relation to the Scottish Consumer Council's recommendations for safety checks and monitoring of contractors' performance?
We are seeking to pull together local authorities to talk about that and to draw out some of the issues that the Scottish Consumer Council mentioned in its report. To hark back to our last discussion, I say that we want to issue some best-practice notes—"guidance" would be too strong a word—with a view to addressing the issue. If that does not take care of all that we think it should take care of, we will consider whether there is more we could do in respect of guidance.
Will the Executive take into account people with additional support needs in implementing the Education (Disability Strategies and Pupils' Educational Records) (Scotland) Act 2002, particularly in relation to the provision of adequate and suitable transport?
Under the 2002 act, local authorities are required to make such provision, so transport ought to be part of their thinking.
Will transport be provided to support universal provision of pre-school education across local authorities?
We do not intend to change our position in that regard and there are a number of reasons for our decision. We are talking about a non-statutory entitlement to pre-school education—parents are not obliged to get their kids into that provision, as they are in relation to school education. We are also acutely conscious of practical difficulties relating to the age of children, the scale and size of buses and other transport implications and we are conscious that there is a lot of choice in provision, which can come in different shapes and sizes across Scotland. A variety of practical factors get in the way of our doing the same as we do in relation to school education.
However, we skew our grant for pre-school education to rural areas because of distance factors; we acknowledge that there are additional costs in rural areas. Furthermore, we have, through community transport initiatives, issued guidance that has encouraged local authorities to consider provision of community transport services in relation to such issues. Local authorities have discretion in that regard.
Might it be possible to provide school transport at a small charge to pupils who live beyond a local authority catchment area but who attend a school in that local authority?
I am not sure that I follow that question.
Would it be possible to provide school transport at a small charge to pupils who live outwith a local authority catchment area but who want to attend a school in that local authority area, which is their neighbouring local authority area?
I would need to consider that further, but my immediate reaction is that that would be a matter for the local authority's discretion. If a school bus started in one local authority area and passed near the house of a person who lived immediately outwith that area, I am sure that discretion exists for a local authority to allow that person to travel to a place where that bus could pick them up. I am not sure that that situation would arise often, other than in some urban areas. We do not intend to change our rules in that regard as I am sure that, if a local authority wanted to accommodate that situation, it could do so.
Do local authorities have the power to extend a bus service—for a charge—to pupils who live within walking distance of the school, in the interests of discouraging the use of cars for short school runs? The parents of a pupil who was not entitled to free transport could buy a bus pass for them as an alternative to using their car.
Four or five years ago, Aberdeenshire Council did that, but I recall that great public controversy ensued. I would, however, have assumed that if there was a spare place in a bus that was passing the door of a child who lives within walking distance of a school, the local authority would have discretion to allow a child to use that bus. I know that that happens in some places for safety reasons. However, I am not clear at the moment about whether the local authority would be able to charge for that service.
In your letter, you said that the issue of attendants is complex and you point out that £34.9 million is available over the next three years for additional staff to support schools in tackling indiscipline. Clearly, however, there are many issues around indiscipline in schools; the provision of attendants on school buses might not be a high priority compared to other issues that a school faces.
On many occasions, my colleague Ken Macintosh has referred to the walking bus, which involves parents. Is there anything that would prevent parent volunteers from acting as attendants on school buses, as long as they were subject to the appropriate disclosure procedures?
I would not have thought so. Again, however, I will double-check that and get back to you. I note that we still have a bit of a job to do on sharing good practice in relation to improving behaviour on school buses and school-bus runs. Local authorities are taking varying approaches to that. One school-bus run in my old secondary school was plagued by difficulties for years until a new head teacher arrived. Within six weeks, the situation was sorted out because of a new procedure that involved significant self-regulation by pupils. I suspect that there is a multiplicity of approaches in schools across Scotland; we probably need to learn from them and work out how lessons can be applied in various circumstances.
On the face of it, the issue might not appear to be high up the priority list in terms of extra support staff, but it causes major concerns to parents, pupils and schools. I am not certain that they would not attach quite high priority to it.
From reading the Official Report of the committee's meetings, the minister will be aware that we were quite disappointed in the revised guidance. Although it addressed and introduced some safety measures, it was still driven by the legal responsibilities of parents to have their children educated, which means that it focuses on the distance rules. Our concern is the joined-up approach, particularly in relation to environmental issues that arise from transport.
I would also like to raise the issue of child protection. You might be aware that one of the instigating factors behind the revised guidance was a petition that was submitted by one of my constituents, whose concern was safety in Livingston, particularly with regard to the underpasses through which pupils must travel on their way to school. The minister might also be aware that concerns had been expressed at that time about the number of sexual assaults in the area. Unfortunately, the petitioner lived in the same street as Simon Harris, the murderer of Rory Blackhall. Although we cannot refer to that particular case, and I would not wish to do so, the situation emphasises that safety issues are in this day and age as important as the legal responsibility of parents to ensure that their children get to school.
We do not want to wrap our children in cotton wool and we want them where possible to walk to school for health and transport reasons—we know that the school run causes a great deal of congestion. However, we also know that parents are unaware that their responsibility for their children ends at 9 o'clock or when the school starts and that teachers' protection responsibilities start only when schools open.
It takes parents time to get to work and they must drop off their children at school before they go to work. Can there be more reflection on how we can have a realistic debate on the risks to children, their transportation to and from schools, attendance issues and who is responsible for what, in a climate in which there are serious concerns about the protection of children and school start times that are not necessarily married to parents' working lives?
After the Rory Blackhall murder, it was suggested that the Executive might want to reflect on attendance and reporting issues, which West Lothian Council is doing. Will you use this opportunity to reflect on the connection between child protection and transport issues? Will you reflect on the necessity of a joined-up approach in transport policy, which will not necessarily be served by circulars and guidance on parents' legal responsibility for getting children to school? The issue is wider and deeper than that. We could usefully engage in a realistic debate in Scotland on how to tackle risk and the protection of children that will help to realistically support health, transport and environment policies and so on.
We are considering in depth attendance reporting in the light of the Rory Blackhall case and the recent case in Edinburgh, so that consideration will take us some time. We will no doubt return to the committee at some point to discuss the matter.
I want to make a general point before I give details in response to the question. Notwithstanding what Fiona Hyslop said, it is important that we recognise that parents have a clear legal responsibility that should not be diminished and of which they must be aware. The state should not take over their responsibility to get their kids to school to be educated—its doing so would have all sorts of implications. Parents must think carefully about getting their kids to school in the light of what they do in the rest of their lives. That is difficult, but there is an underlying position.
That said, Tavish Scott and I are due to have discussions on the general points that Fiona Hyslop made about a joined-up approach by the Executive, and what we should do about the environmental impacts of the school run in Edinburgh and other towns in Scotland. We will consider a range of matters to do with transport policy and school policy, and we will think about whether we can do anything more to deal with environmental impacts and what measures we might use. Tavish Scott is keen to push matters forward, so members should watch this space. We still have thinking to do.
I turn to risks, child protection and the particular circumstances that Fiona Hyslop highlighted in which the route of a child or group of children to school takes them through physical circumstances in which it may be assumed that some risk might arise. In such circumstances, it is entirely within the discretion of the local authority to provide transport. Indeed, when I was a councillor, there was an appeals procedure for parents, which was conducted by councillors, when officials refused the provision of transport because the criteria had not been met. I had frequently to go out and walk the route that a child had to walk to assess whether there was risk. I had to assess streetlights, pavements or particularly bendy or fast bits of road that the child might have to navigate; we frequently overturned official decisions because we thought that risks existed.
I would have thought that councils would assess risks if they were approached to do so. Councils should consider what discretion they have if it is thought that a risk exists in particular circumstances. That said, councils have difficult decisions to make in such circumstances because it is entirely possible in today's world to argue that there is a general protection risk for all children—ergo, all children should be transported to school in some way. That position is unsustainable for the reasons that have been given. People cannot be wrapped in cotton wool—we must help to educate people about managing risks themselves. However, I can envisage circumstances in which there may be routes that children must follow that are assessed as carrying a greater than average risk. There is discretion to allow such assessments to be made. In fact, the rules are constructed as they are in order to allow such decisions to be made where it is judged that that approach is right.
You have answered one of the points that I was going to make to Fiona Hyslop regarding routes and safety. I think that safety, not distance, should be the biggest factor. In some local authority areas, we still have the unseemly spectacle of parents going out and measuring their two miles. I wish that we could get across to the local authorities that that is not necessary any more and that we should consider extending section 51 provision to safe routes. We should encourage local authorities to examine the matter from that point of view, rather than measuring two miles, three miles or whatever. That would be helpful.
Elaine Murray talked about having support staff on the buses. It leaves young people vulnerable not to have some supervision on school buses. That worries me greatly, and I would like to see us moving forward on that and having a concrete policy. It should not be down to local authorities to make that decision; supervision on buses should be part of the in-built structure for school transport. I have absolutely no doubt that the impact on the behaviour of young people coming to school on a well-supervised bus that comes straight into the playground, with staff from the school escorting the children into the areas of the school where they need to be to start the day would much improve circumstances for many teachers as they start their day as well as being beneficial for a lot of young people. A review to examine where that is and is not happening, so that we could make comparisons and get views from educators and parents, would be valuable. It is a key issue for me that there should be supervision on school buses.
I will first answer the point about section 51 provision. The law as constructed gives clear entitlements to parents in respect of distance, which is an important factor. It also gives absolute discretion to local authorities to do what they think is right in their circumstances. I do not think that the law gets in the way of correct decisions being made.
We spend quite a lot of money on trying to create safer routes to school, and we are investing in that—you will see the evidence of that around schools. We are not only trying to ensure traffic safety; we are also helping to determine the safest routes to schools and encouraging kids to take them.
As I said to Elaine Murray, there is a lot that we can still do to improve the flow of best practice of what works in order to improve the circumstances on school buses, which can be very disruptive for some pupils. Supervision might be right in some circumstances; self-regulation by pupils might be even better. There is something to be said for ensuring that pupils themselves take responsibility for their behaviour in such circumstances; however, we do not rule out supervision on buses. In fact, we have increased the supply of cash to allow more decisions of that sort to be made by local authorities if they think that that is the right thing to do. We are moving in the right direction on that, and I do not think that there is any impediment to a local authority doing what it thinks is right by dint of what we are doing, at the centre.
As there are no more questions, I thank the minister for his contribution. We will take a short break before we move on to the final item, which is the budget, in order to allow the minister to change his officials. School transport is an issue on which the committee will want to keep a watching brief. Any updates from the minister in response to specific points in relation to that will be welcome.
Meeting suspended.
On resuming—