Agenda item

A short outline report is attached. There will be a presentation at the meeting.

The Chairman expressed his concerns that the Panel had received quite late in the day a copy of the presentation ‘Getting from A to B – Strategic Transport Review’.  The Chairman felt that the Panel would not be in a position to properly scrutinise this matter considering that Members of the Panel were not having enough time to consider information in the presentation.

The Chairman instructed the officers to send detailed presentation, or a Committee report, well in advance of the next meeting when they are required to present a further update, or a report, on this or other matters.

The Chairman invited Chris Major (Group Manager – Transport and Parking), Richard Morgan (Education Business Manager) and Christopher Wilford (Head of Education Inclusion Services) to give a presentation to the Panel.

The officers highlighted the following points in their presentation:

·  Purpose

·  Update

·  Barriers

·  Review – Home to School Transport

·  SEND – promoting independence

·  Opportunities and challenges

·  Still to do’s…..

·  Next steps

(A full copy of thepresentation is attached as Appendix to these minutes).

The Panel highlighted the following points in their debate:

·  Councillor Richard Samuel felt that the project may go against Council’s commitment to improve the air quality in the area, especially for Bath.  Councillor Samuel commented on the allocation of school places to children in South Bristol, where a certain number of children had to travel across the city to their schools down to parental preference.  Councillor Samuel expressed his concerns that journeys to non-allocated schools would be made by private cars, which would be against Council’s initiative to reduce usage of private vehicles in order to improve air quality.  Councillor Samuel added that he was aware that the Council could not do much on the transport preferences for pupils and asked if the project was joined up with the improvement of air quality.  The officers responded that the project had started before the Air Quality Zone programme.  However, the outcomes of the project would be within the Air Quality Zone requirements.  The Council would, where eligible, get the children on the buses or encourage them to walk or cycle to their schools.  The Council would work with coach operators to ensure that coaches would be available as much as possible.  The officers acknowledged that a query from Councillor Samuel was about children who travel to schools that were not allocated to them.  Less than 10% of secondary school pupils in Bath area had been provided with a transport from the Council; that was because transport had been provided only to pupils who live outside the 3 miles catchment of their allocated school.  Councillor Samuel added that very few of 90% of other children would use busses, or walk/cycle to their schools so their journeys would be in private cars.  Councillor Samuel also said that the Council should take an initiative to provide some sort of transport for the remaining 90% of children which would have less impact on the air quality.

·  The Chairman said that, for many years, one of the big issues was that working parents would take their children to school in their cars on their way to work.  This had contributed to congested parking spaces and blocked roads around the school. 

·  Councillor Michael Evans asked if the £1.1m of savings to date had been associated to the cost of 1.5 officers. The officers replied that that cost had been separate from the savings allocated in the budget. Councillor Evans also asked what sort of proportion a target of £1.9m of savings was from the total cost.  The officers replied that they would get back to Councillor Evans with an answer.

·  Councillor Brian Simmons asked if most of the savings would come from the buses contract hire.  The officers responded that the savings would come from the personal transport budget.  The officers also explained that the Council had been working with the parents of children with special educational needs (SEN); the Council had offered to pay the cost of transport to parents of children with SEN to drive their children to school.

·  Councillor Peter Turner asked if this project was unique for Bath.  The officers responded that the Council had tailored this programme around the needs of the area.  It was important to remember that children with the SEN would need extra support to gain an access to education.  There were 37 strands to the project and the Council had learned from other local authorities on how they exercised their projects.

It was RESOLVED to note the presentation and to receive a further update in 6 months’ time.