School Transport Bill

Public Bill Committee, 9 November 2004.

School Transport Bill

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

I beg to move,

That—

(1) during proceedings on the School Transport Bill, in addition to its first meeting at 9.25 a.m. on Tuesday 9th November, the Standing Committee shall meet at—

(a) 2.30 p.m. on Tuesday 9th November, and

(b) 9.25 a.m. and 2.30 p.m. on Thursday 11th November;

(2) proceedings on the Bill shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at 5 p.m. on Thursday 11th November.

I take this opportunity to welcome your chairmanship, Mr. Conway, and that of Mr. O'Brien, who will be chairing this afternoon's sitting. I wish to express my pleasure in presenting my first Bill for scrutiny in Committee. The Bill has already been scrutinised extensively through a process of pre-legislative debate and scrutiny by both the Transport Committee and the Education and Skills Committee.

The Bill is short. It has only seven clauses and I am confident that we can have a full but brisk debate in Committee under your excellent chairmanship, Mr. Conway. As you know, the Programming Sub-Committee has already met, and I am pleased to move the motion based on its resolution. I look forward both to your chairmanship and to the deliberations of the Committee.

Question put and agreed to.

Frank Cook (Labour, Stockton North)

I remind the Committee that there is a money resolution in connection with the Bill, copies of which are available on the Table in the centre of the Room. I also remind colleagues that adequate notice should be given of amendments. As a general rule, I and my co-Chairman do not intend to call starred amendments, including any starred amendments that may be reached during the afternoon sitting of the Committee.Clause 1 School travel schemes

Clause 1 - School travel schemes

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

I beg to move amendment No. 21, in

clause 1, page 1, line 14, after 'may', insert

', after consultation with school governing bodies and other relevant admissions bodies,'.

Frank Cook (Labour, Stockton North)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments:

No. 56, in

clause 1, page 1, line 15, at end insert—

'1A In making a school travel scheme, a local authority must demonstrate that it has engaged in reasonable consultation about the proposed scheme with parents of children for whom transport to and from school is currently provided by that local authority.'.

No. 30, in

clause 1, page 1, line 16, at end insert—

'2 Prior to making a scheme, the scheme authority will consult with interested parties including, but not limited to—

(a) the Schools Forum,

(b) representatives of denominational schools whose pupils might be affected by the scheme,

(c) teachers' organisations,

(d) representatives of special schools whose pupils might be affected by the scheme,

(e) parent governors of schools whose children will be affected,

(f) further education colleges,

(g) parents whose children are already in receipt of transport provided by the scheme authority,

(h) bus operators, and

(i) other organisations with an interest in the education of children in the scheme area.

3 (1) The scheme authority will publish the details of the proposed scheme and seek comments from interested parties, who will have 28 days from the date of publication of the scheme to comment.

(2) The scheme authority will submit to the appropriate national body a summary of the responses to the consultation together with the scheme authority's own response to the consultation.'.

No. 24, in

clause 1, page 2, line 5, at end insert

'and shall set out their reasons for introducing such a scheme.'.

No. 59, in

clause 1, page 3, line 17, at end insert—

'(3) The appropriate national authority shall not approve a school travel scheme unless the local authority proposing the scheme can demonstrate a reasonable level of support for the scheme from parents of children for whom transport to and from school is currently provided by that local authority.'.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

I wish to underline what the Minister said. I did not realise that this was the first time that the hon. Gentleman had been in control of a Bill in Committee, so I hope that he will realise that on such occasions Ministers are accommodating and take on board a lot of Opposition amendments, and are always keen to split the difference on issues that arise. At least, I think that that is what happens. I want to put on the record how pleased I am to see you in the Chair, Mr. Conway, as I will also be pleased to see Mr. O'Brien this afternoon. I hope that we shall enjoy the experience.

The purpose behind the Bill was summed up beautifully for me when I read some oral evidence presented to the Education and Skills Committee, when a thoughtful witness, Mr. Sykes from Herefordshire, who has experience of many school transport schemes, came out with a somewhat unguarded comment. He said:

''Surely the Bill is about unpacking the procedures around the three mile entitlement, as far as I can see that is the Bill, that is what it allows authorities to look at. It allows the flexibility to move into those areas, fundamentally that is what the Bill is unpacking.''

The point that the Bill is a reversal of entitlement was made on Second Reading.

Amendment No. 21 is designed to deal with an issue that crops up soon in connection with reversing the entitlement, which is what will happen to

denominational and other schools that fear that they may be adversely affected, and that either pupils will not attend the school or, if they do, they will not represent a wide enough social mix. When the Secretary of State introduced the Bill on Second Reading, he wanted assurance that everyone was truly on board. At the moment there is no such assurance, and we do not know whether the Bill will provide that assurance. The amendment proposes that schemes can come forward, but that there should be a process through which schemes are properly evolved, after consultation with school governing bodies and other relevant admissions bodies. I assume that at some point, various archdiocesan and diocesan authorities will have impact on, and input into, such matters.

If we are to have uncontentious schemes that deliver a satisfactory outcome for the full range of schools, it is essential that, when any scheme is introduced, it is adequately consulted on by school governing bodies and other relevant admissions bodies, not simply imposed by the local authority.

Consultation can have various meanings in different places. It often means that people are asked what they want to happen, after which something is done anyway. All hon. Members who have had anything to do with consultations on post office closures will be familiar with that pattern. However, a meaningful consultation on any school transport scheme is essential to make it work. Apart from anything else, a certain amount of information needs to feed up from below to the people who devise the scheme and a number of practical considerations must be raised. The effect of the school transport scheme on the range of people who may go to a school is crucial.

The amendment would be just the kind of helpful addition that Ministers usually want to take on board, particularly in their first Bill, because it is moved truly in the spirit of consensus and conciliation.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I welcome you to the Chair, Mr. Conway. Like the Minister, I am a novice in leading on a Bill.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

It seems that we are in the hands of complete amateurs. [Laughter.] It is my first Bill, too.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is not referring to your chairmanship, Mr. Conway. The proof of the pudding is in the eating. We will see, as the Committee proceeds, who are the amateurs.

I shall speak to amendment No. 30, which was tabled in my name and that of my hon. Friends the Members for Christchurch (Mr. Chope) and for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson). As the hon. Member for Southport (Dr. Pugh) said, it is important that the Bill, which will radically change the provision of school transport and affect the way in which it is provided to many children throughout the country, has a proper consultation process underpinning any scheme that comes forward from local education authorities wishing to take part in the pilot project.

That is important because it will lead to significant change for many children who currently enjoy free school transport and will impact on many children

with special educational needs. It will impact on the institutions in LEA areas, such as the denominational schools, special schools and schools in rural areas. There is a huge impact in terms of the number of people affected, and also for the institutions.

It is important that if people will lose out as a consequence of the Bill—where they will be charged for transport that has hitherto been free—they are consulted when the scheme is drawn up. The guidance currently available to LEAs is too brief, which is why amendment No. 30 fleshes out the consultation process. The Select Committee on Education and Skills, in paragraph 112 of its pre-legislative scrutiny report, said:

''Well-run schemes should be based on wide consultation with schools as well as other stakeholders and should have secured agreement about their proposals.''

That is the purpose of the amendment.

Amendment No. 30 sets out the range of organisations that we wish to see consulted. The school admission forum is the perfect body for an LEA to consult, because it is already set up to talk about issues, such as school funding and budgets and service contracts between schools and LEAs, and is an automatic, logical focus for consultation with schools to discuss the draft and proposed schemes.

We must also ensure that representatives of denominational schools are consulted properly. It is important to recognise that there is concern within faith groups about the Bill. In later debates on other amendments we will talk about some of the aspects affecting denominational schools. Many such schools are concerned that charging for school transport will reduce the choice available to parents. We must ensure that they are happy and that they understand the schemes. They have concerns not only about the impact on their schools, but about the impact of charging on some of the less affluent families in our communities.

Another group will be affected too. On Second Reading we highlighted the fact that two thirds of the existing school transport budget is spent on children with special educational needs. That is a very visible part of the budget, and some local education authorities might feel that costs could be squeezed out of it through introducing these schemes. We must ensure that schools that have pupils who receive free transport because they have special educational needs should be part of the consultation process, so that the people who draw up the scheme can fully understand the impact on children who attend such a school, and think carefully about the distances that they travel.

I want to pick up on the issue of further education colleges as consultees. The implementation of the Tomlinson report on the education of children aged 14 to 19 will require greater flexibility between schools and further education colleges. Many more children aged 14 to 16 will access vocational parts of the curriculum at their local further education college. We must ensure that any draft scheme that comes forward takes into account that changing architecture of 14-to-16 education, and that further education colleges

express their views about how schemes will affect children who want to attend such colleges for that part of their education.

The bus operators too will be affected by the Bill, particularly in areas where they currently operate schemes that a local authority might seek to take over—through yellow buses, similar schemes, or their own plans to provide transport for children. As so many bus operators already provide significant transport to our schools, we must ensure that they are part of the consultation process.

Proposed new paragraphs 3(1) and 3(2) in amendment No. 30 arise from my concern to ensure that the scheme authorities have a proper consultation process and that time is taken over it; we have suggested 28 days for people to comment. It is also important that when the scheme comes forward to the Secretary of State for his approval, scheme authorities have identified the local concerns to him. Before he approves the scheme, he should know what they are and, more particularly, how the scheme authority has responded to them. The Select Committee said that it was important that

''Well-run schemes should be based on wide consultation with schools as well as other stakeholders and should have secured agreement about their proposals.''

Clearly, a scheme that attracts widespread opposition from the local community, which has not been responded to fully by the scheme authority, is unlikely to be effective in achieving the Government's objectives. I think that the amendments are sensible and I hope that the Minister will be able to respond to them. They are about trying to ensure that the consultation process that underpins the scheme rules will be thorough and full, and will deliver the agreement of all stakeholders interested in school transport.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

I very much agree with the hon. Member for Southport about the consensus that exists about the importance of full consultation on this important subject. I think that the only difference that will emerge in this opening debate is about how that is best achieved via the Bill.

Allow me, Mr. Conway, to discuss amendments Nos. 21, 30 and 56, which relate to paragraph 1 of the proposed new schedule 35B to the Education Act 1996. As we have heard in the opening speeches, all of them list bodies or groups of people that the LEA would need to consult formally before submitting its application to the Department for Education and Skills. Amendment No. 21 lists school governing bodies and relevant admissions bodies. Amendment No. 30 sets out a longer, non-exhaustive list of bodies to be consulted, and amendment No. 56 would require a local authority to embark on a reasonable consultation with parents of children for whom transport to and from school is currently provided by the local authority.

I agree with the hon. Members for Southport and for Fareham (Mr. Hoban) that school travel schemes need to engage all local stakeholders—not least the

parents and pupils directly affected, and in particular the parents whose children's transport is provided by the local authority. The stakeholders identified in amendment No. 30 are all significant and must have the opportunity to be involved in putting in place school travel scheme arrangements.

We have envisaged dealing with consultation in a particular way. The prospectus that accompanies the Bill includes a paragraph—paragraph 14—on local consultation, and provides a slightly different list of organisations to be consulted before scheme proposals are submitted for approval, either to the Department for Education and Skills or to the Welsh Assembly. We will add to that list the schools forum and the admissions forum and insert a specific further reference to denominational and special schools to take account of the bodies listed in the amendments. We will also ensure that local consultation pays particular attention to the views of parents whose children's transport is currently provided.

As it stands, the prospectus does not set out a specific process for consultation. On reflection, I think that it might be helpful to set out a minimum requirement, such as the one outlined by the hon. Member for Fareham in amendment No. 30, to remind local education authorities that we expect them to carry out a formal consultation as well as informal discussions during the development phase.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I welcome the Minister's reassurances. Will he outline what would happen if a scheme authority did not follow the process outlined in the prospectus and did not consult the range of groups that he has identified?

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

In those circumstances it would be highly unlikely that the scheme would be given approval. We set out a scheme for consultation in the prospectus, and we expect it to be followed before an authority has any prospect of its scheme being approved. For the local pilots to be successful or have the prospect of success, it is vital that they have buy-in from relevant people in the local community, and that would include the range of organisations listed in the prospectus, as well as those set out in the two amendments. Further education colleges are listed in the prospectus. The hon. Member for Fareham makes a reasonable point about Tomlinson, and we will consider again the wording of the prospectus in light of the Tomlinson proposals.

With officials, I shall give the issue of consultation further thought and I shall have further discussions with local education authorities and others. Depending on their advice, I may make the prospectus more prescriptive. At this stage, I do not want to give a precise commitment on the form that that will take because there are pressures to ensure that we do not end up with something too bureaucratic. I also want to have discussions with colleagues in Wales to ensure that they have the opportunity to discuss the issues with Welsh LEAs and key stakeholders as well.

Amendment No. 30 also relates to the material that will be submitted either to the Department for Education and Skills or the Welsh Assembly as part of

the scheme application. Our draft application form asks for information about the consultation process and the views of partners; the hon. Gentleman raised that point. We will review the application form before we invite bids from potential pilot authorities to ensure that, as part of their bids, applicant authorities submit with their response a summary of responses to the consultation. I hope that the approach that I have set out reassures those who tabled the amendments, and in the light of that, I ask them not to press those amendments.

Roger Casale (Labour, Wimbledon)

I am grateful to you, Mr. Conway, for allowing me to speak to the amendments that stand in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Mr. Drew). I apologise to you and the Minister for not catching your eye when we were discussing the earlier amendments.

I welcome your chairmanship, Mr. Conway, and I welcome the Bill. It is a good and sensible Bill, and I do not want to seem to be trying to derail it by attempting to put too much into it at this stage. Therefore, the amendments that I shall move today will be very much probing amendments. I am encouraged to hear what the Minister said about the amendments proposed by the hon. Member for Southport, which was that the matter would receive further consideration as we took the Bill forward.

I have an interest in the Bill because, like many hon. Members, I have families in my constituency with children who have special educational needs, and who have to be transported between home and school by minicab. As I said at an earlier stage, we have experienced serious deficiencies in the provision of service. It is not just a minicab that is required but an escort to go with the child. Such children are often unable to express themselves verbally, and so if something goes wrong they cannot tell anybody about it. We need to recognise that children who are already in a vulnerable situation may be placed in one that is even more vulnerable as a result of the provision of the service transporting them between home and school.

The issue of consultation is absolutely central to addressing those concerns. We should remember that consultation is also about providing information. Some of the absolutely fundamental information that parents in that situation need to know is whether the minicab driver is licensed; whether he or she has been police checked; how the escort was recruited; whether he or she received appropriate training; and whether he or she has been police checked. Four years ago—I am pleased to say that my local authority has improved considerably since—that was basic, fundamental information that my constituents did not have; that was our starting point. Of course, that led to acute anxiety on their part and a complete lack of confidence in the service provided, upon which they were so dependent.

I tabled amendments Nos. 56 and 59 because we were addressing those fundamental concerns by trying to challenge the council, by holding meetings, and by

approaching the Department and trying to get it to pull its socks up, but we simply did not have a sufficiently strong lever to get the action that we needed to improve the situation quickly enough. As I say, the situation has improved, but it has taken four years.

Since then, I have raised the matter on a number of occasions in the House, including in Prime Minister's questions, and colleagues from all parties have approached me and said that they have experienced similar problems elsewhere. That is why it is important that we examine whether we can deal with the issue in the Bill. It may not be dealt with in this Bill; I know that a road safety Bill will be brought forward, and that may be a more appropriate vehicle for it. However, there is a lacuna and a difficulty, which I believe needs to be addressed through the law.

We must take seriously the opportunity that the Bill gives us, particularly in terms of consultation and providing parents with the basic information that I described, including police checks on drivers and escorts taking children with special educational needs to school. Consultation is an opportunity to ensure that.

I know that amendment No. 56 speaks of a statutory duty to ensure ''reasonable consultation'', but none of us would think it unreasonable, in consultation, to provide users of the service with information on how drivers and escorts are being police checked. Consultation is also a valuable way of improving the service, to the extent that there is a problem; and we all know about the difficulties, including the problem in getting police checks made in time through the Criminal Records Bureau. Users—parents, in this case—and the local authority can work together to address that problem and come up with a different system of registration. My constituent Mary Powell and other parents in the Merton special educational needs network made many constructive suggestions to Merton borough council about how the issue could be addressed. Mention was made of the need to have occupational health forms, and job and character references that are checked before mini-cab drivers and escorts are employed. Identity passes are important, so that when someone Mary Powell has never seen before turns up at her door to take her autistic child on the 30-minute journey to school at least that person has an official identification badge that is easily recognisable, and which Mrs. Powell has confidence in, which means that she knows that that person has been satisfactorily checked.

Frank Cook (Labour, Stockton North)

Order. I am sorry to interrupt the hon. Gentleman but a broad variety of amendments has been selected so I will not allow the discussion to turn into a stand part debate ranging across the Bill. He is in danger of moving on to amendment No. 53, which we will address when we come on to a later group of amendments.

I say not only to the hon. Gentleman but to all Committee members that I intend to keep them firmly to the amendments under discussion; otherwise, as there are so many amendments to this clause we might as well just have a stand part debate and let everybody

talk about whatever they want. For the convenience of the Committee and good order we will rigidly stick to the subject being discussed.

Roger Casale (Labour, Wimbledon)

I am grateful for that, Mr. Conway. I have made my point about why such an amendment is needed. The purpose of the amendment is to introduce a duty to consult with parents whose children are existing users of local authority school transport services. That is a fundamental requirement if parents are to have confidence in the service. It is also a mechanism for providing a better service than that which has been on offer to my constituents, for example in the situation I have just described.

Peter Atkinson (Conservative, Hexham)

I rose earlier and tried to catch your eye, Mr. Conway, because I feared that the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Roger Casale) was not going to speak to amendment No. 59. He has not spoken to it to any great extent. However, I want to speak in support of amendment No. 59, which was tabled in his name and that of the hon. Member for Stroud, because it is a good amendment. The Minister did not comment on it because it had not been discussed when he made his speech.

Amendment No. 59 gives parents in a particular area an absolute lock over whether the scheme goes ahead. I support that. I represent a large rural constituency—which you know, Mr. Conway. My main concern is that school transport costs are extremely high in Northumberland; the cost for the local educational authority is about £400 to £500 per pupil per year. If the scheme were to involve charging, it is clear that, if amendment No. 59 were agreed to, the local authority would find it impossible to demonstrate that there was a reasonable level of support for the scheme because clearly no parents would vote for a scheme that introduced charges for something that they already got for free.

I am an enthusiast for amendment No. 59 and I would like to hear what the Minister has to say about it.

Huw Edwards (Labour, Monmouth)

I am pleased to be able to support in principle the amendments of my hon. Friends the Members for Wimbledon and for Stroud and, I hope, of the hon. Members for Southport and for Fareham.

I have an interest in this subject because I have been involved in consultations on two main areas. Committee members will be aware of an organisation called BUSK, which has campaigned to improve safety on school transport. Pat Harris, the leader of that campaign, was a constituent of mine and I was quite involved in her campaign in the early '90s. Since my re-election in 1997, I returned to the subject of school transport because of the overcrowding issue. I secured an Adjournment debate on that, which was responded to by the Under-Secretary of State for Wales, the hon. Member for Islwyn (Mr. Touhig). There has been serious overcrowding on the school

transport system and anybody who has consulted on the issue in my constituency would wish that problem to be solved.

I am not talking about the contract buses—contracted by the local authority—that are used to transport children. My main concern has been the service buses that are used by pupils, and which has led to considerable overcrowding. I secured an Adjournment debate on the problem of the Llandogo to Monmouth service in the Wye valley, where 50 to 60 children were boarding a single-decker bus, which became heavily overcrowded and transported them 6 or 7 miles up the Wye valley at speeds of 55 to 60 miles an hour—or whatever its speed limit was. That was dangerous for pupils who were standing. I realised that the regulations on the number of passengers being carried on such buses—and on any public transport buses—needed to be reviewed.

What if I asked the Minister, or any Committee member, ''How many passengers can a 52-seater bus carry?'' They may be amazed to know that the answer is 52, plus 20 standing and 26 who are allowed to sit, if they are under 15, under the three-for-two rule. That situation is due to the Education Act 1944 and leads to considerable overcrowding. Thankfully, in my constituency the county council funded an additional bus, which has relieved that problem, but we are dealing with the law and I hope that the Committee will consider this issue.

Consultation has been important and has been discussed by the Monmouth comprehensive—[Interruption.]

Frank Cook (Labour, Stockton North)

Order. The hon. Gentleman started to range wider than children standing on buses, but the Clerk and I noticed that he said the magic word ''consultation'' just in time.

Huw Edwards (Labour, Monmouth)

Consultation is the underlying theme of this discussion, and it relates to pupils through the school forums involving teachers and other organisations.

I notice in amendment No. 30, tabled by the hon. Member for Fareham, the words:

''other organisations with an interest in the education of children in the scheme area.''

One such organisation, which has recently been formed, is Stuart's Campaign. Committee members will recall the tragic case in the Vale of Glamorgan a couple of years ago, when a service bus crashed, leading to the death of a young boy sitting in the top deck. The cause of the crash is believed to have been horseplay among pupils on the lower deck. The group organising Stuart's Campaign was formed, and my hon. Friend the Member for Vale of Glamorgan (Mr. Smith) has been closely involved with it. I would hope that such an organisation has to be consulted about school transport plans.

I thank the Minister for his reassurance that there will be greater consultation and I hope that the spirit of the amendments will be adopted, or at least that the Government will consider them.

Mr. David Drew (Stroud) (Lab/Co-op): I am delighted to serve under your Chairmanship, Mr. Conway. I apologise for missing the first couple of minutes of the Committee. I was on a late train—so some of us have views on transport at the moment.

I shall speak narrowly to the two amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon and myself and add some points that have not been dealt with yet. Consultation is so important because transport is an acute problem at certain times of the year—usually at the start of the school year and in particular circumstances. I do not know whether other Committee members have encountered the same problem as me, but too often, at the start of the school year, school travel arrangements have been left to a lottery.

One of the pressure points that I would like to see fully explored is the emphasis not just on the local authority to ensure that it knows what it is doing, but also on the operators. Too often operators pull out of arrangements, giving fairly late notice and sometimes breaking contracts, thereby leaving pupils vulnerable. That is especially difficult and true where there are special arrangements for children with special educational needs. As I said on Second Reading—I make no apology for restating it—one of my red lines for this Bill is that we must be especially clear that those children who are moved around to special schools, or have special arrangements because of their special educational needs, are secure in the knowledge that they will always be foremost in any consultation arrangement.

It is also important that we discuss whether there is a possibility of some reorganisation. Thankfully, under this Government there have been very few school closures. However, inevitably there are areas, particularly within special education—including special education for children with moderate learning difficulties—in which a better arrangement could come out of some future proposal. However, one of the key issues that must always be addressed is the securing of transport arrangements for the children involved, who will inevitably have to change their existing arrangements.

I hope that the Minister will consider the amendments carefully. I would like to think that they could be included in the Bill, although I am always willing to accept that their wording may need re-working. Given the spirit of consensus that has broken out in the Committee, I would hope that we could, if anything, strengthen the arrangements. Amendment No. 59 would provide an armlock at national level if there was real dispute at a local level. A lot of parents would like such a failsafe; they would have a second layer to appeal to if they felt that arrangements were unfair and ill thought through at a local level. I hope that the Minister will see the amendments as more than probing amendments. They are designed to toughen up the Bill a little so that a proper and foolproof level of consultation is included.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

I shall respond in particular to the points raised in amendments Nos. 56 and 59, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon. I addressed some of the issues in amendment No. 56 in my earlier remarks, so I shall focus on amendment No. 59.

My hon. Friend raised important issues, such as security, police checks and the role of the Criminal Records Bureau, some of which we will return to when we discuss amendment No. 53 and the amendments in that group that he has tabled. Today he has built on the important contribution that he made to the debate on Second Reading. I believe that that will be important not only for his local authority; there will be lessons to be learned for others that are part of the scheme as well.

I am happy to give my hon. Friends the Members for Monmouth (Mr. Edwards) and for Vale of Glamorgan the absolute assurance that organisations such as Stuart's Campaign, with which they have been closely associated, and BUSK would be consulted. If such schemes are to move forward, it is vital that there is maximum local support for them. Clearly, engaging with organisations that take up issues such as the tragic death of Stuart Cunningham-Jones is exactly the sort of approach that we want authorities to take at the local level.

My hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth mentioned that one of the issues associated with the death of Stuart Cunningham-Jones was the behaviour of other young people on the bus. The hon. Member for Fareham has tabled an amendment on the issue of pupil behaviour, which is significant for school transport and a significant factor behind the reluctance of some parents and pupils to use the school bus or public transport and their preference for using cars.

My hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Mr. Drew) rightly placed emphasis on engaging with parents of pupils with special educational needs, and, more broadly, on engaging with organisations that represent them. We shall return to that issue later. My hon. Friend also reminded us, rightly, of the critical importance of the role of bus operators, which are listed not only in his amendment but in the prospectus.

Amendment No. 59 would add a sub-paragraph to paragraph 8 of schedule 35B. Its effect would be to prevent the Secretary of State or the National Assembly for Wales from approving school travel schemes unless they had reasonable support among parents for whose children transport is currently provided by the local authority. Hon. Members on both sides of the House have made a strong argument in favour of really engaging with those parents whose sons and daughters currently either benefit from free transport or have transport provided for them.

The focus of the Bill is on helping local education authorities to put together local travel schemes that cater for the needs of all pupils in the LEA area. We want to move away from the current position, in which LEAs focus on providing statutory transport, mostly by bus. We want LEAs to provide integrated schemes

that cater for walking and cycling wherever possible, as well as for bus use in cases where pupils live beyond reasonable walking distance.

It is important that parents in the system are engaged with the scheme, but we have to recognise the needs of those who do not qualify for free transport. We recently carried out a survey that showed that, in the case of 64 per cent. of children who travelled to school by bus or taxi, it was the parents, not the LEA, who paid. The average amount per child per week was £7.29. Many other children walk or cycle to school, and we want school travel schemes to consider their needs as well as those of bus users.

Given that parents of pupils for whom school transport is provided are a small proportion of the total number of parents in many areas, I cannot accept that we should give those parents a veto on school travel schemes when a much wider group of people could benefit. However, it is of course important, for the reasons given, that their point of view is taken into account.

The prospectus already requires authorities to consult widely and to include details of the consultation process in their applications, as I have said. We will ensure that the application includes a specific summary of the views of those parents for whom transport is currently provided by the LEA, alongside the views of other stakeholders. I hope that the proposed mechanism will meet the concerns of my hon. Friends the Members for Wimbledon and for Stroud, and that they will not press their amendments.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

There has been a very consensual atmosphere so far—disturbingly so, I might say. The Minister has certainly sought to split the difference. One can agree to an amendment and change the legislation, or disagree with it and not change the legislation. At first, I thought that he would go for the ministerial compromise of agreeing to the amendment but not changing the legislation in any way; however, he seems to have incorporated in his remarks a suggestion that changes will be made in the prospectus, at least. There is merit in that, and also in surveying the full range of proposals put forward today. They are diverse in character.

I suppose that it could be suggested that the details and format of consultations are a matter for bodies quite apart from, or in addition to, Parliament. However, the Minister has conceded quite definitely that, in principle, there is a requirement to consult. There is a duty on the part of anybody submitting a school transport scheme to engage in consultation. Without entering into the exact details of how that consultation might go and precisely whom it might involve, I cannot think of an overwhelming objection to putting that duty in the Bill.

I am happy to withdraw the amendment for the moment, but I suggest to the Minister that if he is so enthusiastic for, and accepting of, the argument that consultation is an important prerequisite for a decent school transport scheme, it might be worth specifying

that in the Bill, and perhaps bringing forward an amendment that says that on Report. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Frank Cook (Labour, Stockton North)

I remind the Committee that if hon. Members wish to press any of the grouped amendments to a Division, they may do so according to the order in which they appear on the amendment paper. If hon. Members tell me or the Clerk that they so wish, I will ensure that the amendment is formally moved at the right time, so that we are all clear about what we are doing.

George Young (Conservative, North West Hampshire)

I beg to move amendment No. 23, in page 1, line 15, leave out 'or any part'.

Frank Cook (Labour, Stockton North)

With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment No. 22, in page 1, line 15, at end insert

', or in conjunction with another local authority, make a school travel scheme for the whole or any part of their area'.

George Young (Conservative, North West Hampshire)

It is a pleasure to serve under your benign but firm chairmanship, Mr. Conway. I shall speak to amendment No. 23, the impact of which would be to oblige a local education authority to apply any scheme to the whole of its area, rather than to a part of it. In tabling this amendment, I beat my Front Bench to the draw. It is essentially a probing amendment. I assume that this provision is in the Bill because local authorities want it to be included as they wish to apply a travel scheme to a part of their area rather than to all of it; it would be helpful if the Minister could confirm that. If that is the case, I would be interested to know whether the area in question will be defined by schools or by where the children live.

To revert to our recent debate about consultation, it would be easier to consult if the whole of an area were covered by a travel scheme, because if an attempt were made to consult on a part of an area it may be found that, for whatever reason, the people consulted were not covered by it. Also, in terms of contracts with the transport authorities, I imagine that it would be easier for the education authority to cover the whole of the area and have a similar contract for all the buses than to have one contract using the provisions under the Bill for part of the area and another contract for other areas.

It is important to try to avoid complexity for schools and families. However these areas are defined—whether by where schools are located or where the family lives—there is the potential for complexities. If the area is defined by school so that all the schools are covered, families that send their children to a school within that area will have one regime but a school that is further away and is outside the scheme will have a different regime. If it is defined by the area in which people live rather than by school, there will be similar potential complexities; some families in a village who send their children to one school might be covered by a travel scheme and other families who send their children to another school might have a different regime because it is in an excluded area.

The amendment is intended to find out the criteria and reasons for this measure. Is the legislation's focus on urban areas so that traffic congestion in our cities can be addressed, or is it envisaged that it will apply to rural areas as well?

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I support amendment No. 23. It goes to the heart of one of the important issues in this Bill, which is the pilots—the size of the area covered by them and the criteria used to determine who falls within and without the pilot areas.

If a scheme is based on the location of parents, I am concerned that a situation might arise in which some pupils at a school receive free transport and others do not. Will that constitute discrimination against the parents who are not in receipt of free school transport? If the scheme is based on the location of schools, who will decide which schools are in and out of the pilot area, and what will be the impacts on the schools that are without the pilot area and those that are within?

I understand the attraction of having a pilot scheme across a part of a local education authority area. My constituency and that of my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young) fall within Hampshire's LEA. It is one of the largest shire counties, stretching from Aldershot and Andover in the north to the New Forest and Fareham in the south. If one wanted to look at the effects of a pilot scheme, it would be difficult to do so if it covered the whole of that LEA as it serves very different communities.

There is also the question of what areas a pilot will cover if it covers only a part of a county. In my constituency, there are five secondary schools and very few children are in receipt of free transport because it is a predominantly suburban area where most children live within 3 miles of a secondary school. A school transport scheme in that area would be of interest in terms of the effects on urban traffic congestion but it might not give any indication as to the impact of such a scheme on the more rural areas of the county. In my constituency, there is not much movement between schools. Most children go the school in whose geographical catchment area they live. Little evidence would be gained from a pilot in my constituency on the impact of charging on school choice. It is easier to monitor the effects of a partial scheme in such a small area and some benefits are to be gained from that. Alternatively, one might examine areas in which there is much more variety of school choice and area—for example, with both rural and urban parts. Local authorities will need guidance from the Department and from the Welsh Assembly as to what should comprise a partial pilot scheme area.

There are some LEAs for which a pilot scheme that covers only part of the area is wholly inappropriate. Portsmouth has a very small unitary authority and I do not believe that it could be divided in half and have a scheme that affected only part of it. Southampton falls into the same priority.

The other amendment in the group allows LEAs to work together and one might find that a pilot scheme that covers the urban part of south Hampshire—ranging from Portsmouth and Southampton through Fareham and Eastleigh—might be an interesting way of seeing the impact on a variety of areas and of running across boundaries.

In relation to the boundary between the Portsmouth and Hampshire LEAs, we know that some pupils swap from Portsmouth schools into Fareham and into Hampshire schools. The impact on those sorts of journeys would be interesting to monitor in a pilot scheme that covered several LEAs.

Important issues need to be teased out about the ability of LEAs to pilot schemes in part of an area or between LEAs. While it looks attractive to LEAs to go for a partial scheme, as my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire said, it is riddled with complexity and difficulty. Schemes need to be well thought through in order to address those issues.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

I would like to speak in favour amendment No.22, which I tabled, and make some comments about amendment No. 23.

The two amendments are based on almost different directions. As I understand it, under amendment No. 23 a pilot can only ever be a whole authority pilot. That puts an element of restriction that does not currently exist into pilot schemes. Amendment No.22 states that a local authority may put forward a scheme

''in conjunction with another local authority . . . for the whole or any part of their area''.

It adds an element of flexibility, not restriction, into what can and cannot be done in a pilot.

My reason for tabling amendment No.22 is that local authorities are fairly strange beasts in many respects. They are lines on a map and do not necessarily reflect natural transport routes or a wide sense of community. When we conjure names such as Sandwell and Sefton, we struggle to find them on the map. Local authorities are, by and large, administrative conveniences and not natural arrangements for organising transport. Many of them have a supervening transport authority, which sits above them and links them in that given area.

Not only are local authorities not well connected with culture or community, they are not especially well connected with geography or with transport routes. I could advance that as a kind of a priori argument, but I think that in the evidence to the Select Committee there were instances where imaginative local authorities had co-operated with other local authorities and with the local passenger transport authority to produce schemes, sometimes quite small-scale ones, that worked within an area but crossed local authority boundaries. Bus providers also are not particularly sensitive to local authority boundaries and neither is the train service.

As I have said, passenger transport authorities operate over a number of local authority boundaries and are used to working in collaboration with several local authorities on specific projects. In most urban environments, the passenger transport authorities are

familiar with the model whereby local authorities collaborate in a transport scheme that is of benefit to the whole community.

There is a certain amount of practical sense in amendment No. 22. I would not die in the ditch over it, but it offers some flexibility, especially in areas where communities across local authority boundaries are quite well linked to the schools the children attend and where a scheme would work well. The amendment would incorporate flexibility into the Bill that is currently not there. If people were up for pilots, there could be a greater variety of them if the spirit of the amendment were accepted.

However, for various reasons, amendment No. 23 would provide for a lesser number of pilots, although I accept that the arrangements would be characterised by less complexity, as the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire said. However, complexity is not the only issue to bear in mind; whole authority pilot schemes would be fairly formidable to set up. Given the current range of pilots, several local authorities are suggesting that they would have difficulty in carrying them out and that they would require pump priming. Many hon. Members have suggested that there should be pump priming for such schemes.

If we seriously want pilots to operate in order to gain the best information, we do not need to be so restrictive. Opposition Members have said that there will be differential effects. If a pilot were set up in an area, some people would be outside its range. But such is the nature of pilots. How can they be different? If they were the same for everyone, they would not be pilots. Unless they were piloted in terms only of their time duration as opposed to their spatial limitation, they would be schemes. We are familiar in most environments with pilots being run with a range of schemes in areas by specific local authorities, not only on transport, but other matters. I am not sure that amendment No. 23 would guarantee the greater success of pilots than the Bill, as drafted, would, but amendment No. 22 would offer flexibility that is not in the Bill.

Janet Dean (Labour, Burton)

I am pleased to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Conway. As has been said, amendments Nos. 22 and 23 are opposites. I have some sympathy with amendment No. 22 in that it would offer the opportunity of reaching across borders. Pupils from Derbyshire choose to attend a school in Uttoxeter in my constituency. Obviously, they pay for their transport over the border, but such issues were reflected in comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth when he referred to overcrowding on the buses.

If we are considering whether such schemes are partial or whole for authorities such as Staffordshire, we should also look over the border at the impact of those schemes and the benefits that they could bring to pupils who, by tradition, attend school in the authority area. Whether we look at an authority-wide or partial scheme for pilots is important. My authority covers a

huge area and authorities, such as Staffordshire, may want to consider partial trials rather than those that would cover the whole authority area. Even when pupils are already paying for transport because they attend schools outside the catchment area, we should consider how to accommodate them within a transport plan. If the Minister can reassure us that authorities will be able to make arrangements with their neighbouring authority, that would be of great help.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

This has been an important debate and I am grateful to Opposition Members and my hon. Friend the Member for Burton (Mrs. Dean) for their participation. The right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire was right to say that the provisions reflect some of our discussions with local government. I wish first to emphasise that we are keen to get applications from authorities for authority-wide schemes. However, we also want authorities to have the flexibility to develop the best possible pilot schemes. In a sense, there is a trade-off between the danger of complexity, to which the right hon. Gentleman correctly referred, and the advantages of flexibility, to which the hon. Member for Southport referred. The Bill is deliberately deregulatory, and is intended to provide flexibility for local education authorities to design pilot schemes that best suit the needs of their local areas.

During the consultation process with local government, a number of LEAs suggested that some of the larger authorities in particular might wish to develop schemes that address issues in a limited geographical area. That strikes at the point that the right hon. Gentleman made. An authority might wish to maintain existing arrangements in one area, while trying new arrangements elsewhere.

I was struck by the comments from the hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson), which built on what he said on Second Reading, and by the similar points made by the right hon. Member for Berwick-upon-Tweed (Mr. Beith). There are areas of rurality in which the distances are so great that an authority would not wish to consider changes to existing arrangements because benefits could not arise. However, in the same county or authority—I do not know if this would apply in Northumberland, but it might elsewhere—a scheme could apply to a suburban, urban or semi-rural part of the area. We have included this provision to enable that to happen.

George Young (Conservative, North West Hampshire)

Will the Minister clarify whether the defined area is for school or residential purposes?

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

Our current thinking is that school travel schemes are based on the home residence of the child. However, in the light of what the right hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Hexham have said, I shall reconsider that aspect in consultation with local government and others to see if we can build in more flexibility. They raised a good point about whether we could refer to the school as well as or instead of the home. We may need flexibility on that point depending on the local area—the hon. Gentleman gave good examples from his constituency about how that might operate.

Amendment No. 22, as a number of hon. Members have said, takes us in a different direction. For the reasons given by my hon. Friend the Member for Burton and the hon. Member for Southport, there are good arguments for collaboration and co-operation across what are often artificial LEA boundaries. During consultation, a number of LEAs suggested that we consider joint schemes, and we contemplated allowing for them in the Bill, with two or more LEAs making a single application. However, we concluded that there are a number of difficulties with such an approach. For example, once a scheme had started, what would we do if one LEA wanted to amend the scheme for its area but the other did not? What if, following piloting, one LEA wanted to revoke the scheme whereas the other wanted it to continue because it worked well in its area? The joint schemes that the amendment envisages could meet some of those problems.

Let me make it clear that as the Bill stands, two or more LEAs could submit identical schemes to run concurrently. If LEAs face similar issues—this relates particularly to the comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Burton—we would encourage local LEAs to collaborate, especially if there were cross-boundary issues to be addressed.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

In London, with which the Minister is more familiar given his role as the Minister in the education team responsible for London matters, there are huge cross-borough movements of pupils every day—41 per cent. of children in Lambeth are educated outside Lambeth. Given the impact of that on traffic congestion, the issue of LEAs working together is important, but there is the additional aspect that much of school transport in London is dealt with by Transport for London.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

The hon. Gentleman raises an important point. I have had informal discussions about this matter with Transport for London and Committee members may have received representations from that body. Further work is required to consider the different elements relating to London. We may receive expressions of interest from a number of boroughs that could come together in the way that I have just described. Although I am not aware that we have received such expression at this stage, that may be possible, and I agree that Transport for London would have a critical role to play in that respect.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

As I understand it, the Department has in mind a limited number of pilots. If, as I hope, the Bill is popular when it is enacted, and if a lot of local authorities want to join together and submit separate schemes as part of a joint scheme, would those count as one pilot or several?

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

We want some flexibility. We have talked about a rough number of 20, but my hon. Friend is right to say that if such pilots prove successful and there is a clear basis for a scheme that will work—not just in one authority, but elsewhere—we will have the opportunity, through secondary legislation, to

open up the possibility for other authorities to become part of the programme. That flexibility is important. We will deal later with the specific features of the Bill that enable that to happen, at which point I will be able to go into more detail in response to the question asked by my hon. Friend.

The benefits of collaboration, which the hon. Member for Southport set out in speaking to amendment No. 22, can be achieved as I have said, rather than as is proposed in the amendment, which has some difficulties. I hope that the amendment will be withdrawn.

George Young (Conservative, North West Hampshire)

Given that well-informed, courteous reply it would be impertinent for me to press my amendment to a Division, so I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

I beg to move amendment No. 29, in page 2, line 8, at end insert—

'(aa) arrangements for the safety of children embarking or disembarking from the transport provided,'.

Frank Cook (Labour, Stockton North)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments: No. 47, in page 2, line 8, at end insert—

'(aa) arrangements for the safety of the transport under the scheme,'.

No. 25, in

page 2, line 16, after 'suitable', insert 'and safe'.

No. 26, in

page 2, line 18, after 'within', insert 'safe'.

No. 48, in

page 2, line 30, at end insert—

(3A) No pupil shall be entitled to transport under a school travel scheme where his behaviour puts at risk the safety of other pupils using the same mode of transport.'.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

Have I withdrawn amendment No. 22, Mr. Conway?

Frank Cook (Labour, Stockton North)

Fortunately, the hon. Gentleman does not need to, because it was grouped for debate purposes only. Unless I call him to move it formally, it is not moved, so he does not have to withdraw it and we all swing along happily together.

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

I am delighted to serve under your chairmanship, Mr. Conway. Having served on Committees chaired by you, I know you to be fair and wise.

It is a pleasure to see that a number of amendments to do with safety for children and vulnerable people travelling to and from school have been grouped together. My amendment deals specifically with safety on school bus journeys, but others in the group raise concerns that are equally valuable.

Hon. Members may have noticed that I have tabled a new clause relating to another part of the Bill that would import into our law an American law against motorists on the road overtaking school buses when they stop to let pupils on or off. If Parliament does not think that a new law for all motorists is appropriate, would it be appropriate to draw the attention of local authorities seeking to pilot new ways of making the

school journey to some aspects of American law that could be imported into their existing school bus contracts?

I shall give some examples from America, where there is a law in every state, rather than a single federal law. In Arizona, every bus must have a sign and show flashing lights when pupils get on or off, and every bus in Maine has to shown flashing lights when doing so. In Missouri, every bus must have a mechanical and electrical signalling device and even a sign on the back saying, ''State law: stop while bus is loading and unloading.'' In New York, there have to be flashing lights and in Washington state, hazard warning lamps have to flash. That gives local authorities some idea about what they could do to buses at present, even without there being a law to say that motorists have to stop while the bus is stationary so that pupils can embark or disembark.

I ask the Minister to consider that, in the longer term, it would be desirable for all motorists to give their attention to having to stop if the bus is letting pupils off or taking them on. However, even in the short term we could start making more visible to all motorists the fact that there are vulnerable people getting off and on school buses. Some of those people might not have had the same instruction or have the same road sense as others, and motorists ought to be careful. The kind of signals and signs that I mentioned might be helpful to all motorists.

I would not like to finish without reassuring everyone that travel to school by bus is of course already much safer than all the other ways of travelling to school. I would not want people to think that this is a serious issue—well, it is serious for everyone concerned, but travelling by bus is already a safe way to travel to school. I would like to probe the Minister on whether, when it comes to making the school bus that bit more visible, it would not be appropriate to start with authorities taking part in the pilot schemes.

George Young (Conservative, North West Hampshire)

I shall speak briefly to amendments Nos. 25 and 26 in my name, which pick up the hon. Gentleman's theme. I want to focus on seat belts in the context of safety. At the moment, there is a rather confused regime; if one gets on a bus in London, as many children do to go to school, there probably will not be a safety belt on it. If one gets on a school bus, it may or may not have safety belts. As I understand the position, the Government leave it to the discretion of the local education authority to specify in a contract whether the school bus should have safety belts.

A number of families who take their children to school by car, but who are interested in the pilot schemes and are moving towards a more environmentally sympathetic means of transport, have raised with me the question of whether the school bus will have seat belts. At the moment, while they are driving their children to school, they are secure in their seats because the car has safety belts. If the proposition

is that the children should get on the school bus, and the school bus does not have safety belts, that acts as a disincentive.

As I mentioned on Second Reading, in the village of Shipton Bellinger in my constituency there is a campaign among those who send their children to school in Andover to substitute the current bus for one fitted with safety belts. Only yesterday I had a letter from a constituent on that very theme. It says:

''The new contract''—

between Hampshire county council and Clegg and Brooking—

''means that the children are conveyed in safe, clean, warm and seat belted vehicles.''

The previous contract did not provide for seat-belted buses. The letter continues:

''I now can go off to work myself knowing they are in capable hands.''

There is a different regime for coaches, because there is a difference between a coach and a bus.

The Government want pilots and want to get people, including children, out of cars and on to buses. Under this brave new scheme, it is important that the best buses are available. If some clapped-out bus with no seat belts arrives under a travel scheme, a lot of the support for pilot schemes will disappear.

My two amendments are basically probing amendments. Are the Government planning to take the opportunity offered by the pilots to get the best, safest, warmest buses available in order to change public attitudes, or will they be neutral and leave it entirely to the local education authority to decide what sorts of buses are put into the pilot schemes? I hope that the Minister will give LEAs a signal that the pilots are an opportunity to change public perceptions and make a statement about safety, and I hope that he will encourage the LEAs that are part of the pilots to specify that they want buses with seat belts.

Huw Edwards (Labour, Monmouth)

I add my support for the spirit of the amendments, which are essentially about getting into the Bill a presumption that there is safety in any arrangements made. I come back to the example that I quoted earlier: it is fundamentally unsafe for pupils to be travelling long distances on very overcrowded buses, with many of them standing, or sitting three to a seat. That is unsafe not only for those pupils, but for other ordinary passengers who get on the bus. It is also fundamentally wrong that contracts that presume there will be overcrowding should be entered into with bus companies—BUSK calls that institutionalised overcrowding. I hope that in our discussions of the Bill we can have a presumption in favour of safety and against institutionalised overcrowding and that my hon. Friend the Minister will ensure that that presumption is included in the Bill.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I shall speak to amendments Nos. 47 and 48. I echo the comments of the hon. Member for Monmouth and my right hon. Friend the Member for North-West Hampshire on the importance of safety.

The Minister referred to the pre-legislative scrutiny that the Bill has undergone. It is a lucky Bill in the sense that it has had two lots of such scrutiny, one from the Education and Skills Committee and the other from the Transport Committee.

Huw Edwards (Labour, Monmouth)

Will the hon. Gentleman also acknowledge that the Welsh Assembly Subject Committee on Education and Lifelong Learning is currently undertaking a scrutiny of school transport? Unfortunately, it will not complete its deliberations until after the Bill's passage. However, it is part of the scrutiny that is being undertaken in Wales.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

It is perhaps regrettable that that scrutiny process will not be completed until after the Bill's passage, because there are measures in the legislation that relate to Wales, and particularly to Welsh language schools. It would be good if that scrutiny process were speeded up so that its conclusions could be reflected on Report or when the Bill passes to another place.

Paragraph 33 of the Transport Committee report states:

''We were surprised that the Government admits that it does not know about the effects of the best value regime on the quality of school buses. It is clear from our evidence that many authorities interpret 'best value' as 'lowest cost'. This must be wrong. The Government should set national minimum standards for LEA school bus contracts.''

That would illuminate some of the inconsistencies that hon. Members have pointed out, particularly on the use of seat belts and whether they are available in buses or coaches. Some national standards would clarify such matters and address some of the safety aspects of bus travel. Interestingly, the Government's response to the Transport Committee listed three or four statutory instruments that referred to the safety of buses and coaches. That shows the complexity that is involved in LEAs addressing the safety aspects of the contracts that they let.

Amendment No. 48 relates to the remarks in an earlier debate of the hon. Member for Monmouth on the bus accident in the vale of Glamorgan, which was deemed to have perhaps been caused by misbehaviour on school buses. Many parents are put off from sending their child on a school bus because of the risk of misbehaviour. The Education and Skills Committee's report on the Bill states:

''Poor pupil behaviour on buses was cited by parents as another major concern. Not only can this endanger the safety of passengers as drivers are distracted or equipment vandalised, it also makes for an unpleasant experience for other pupils travelling on the bus. There is some confusion over who exactly is responsible for ensuring good pupil behaviour on school buses.''

Later amendments about the use of escorts on buses might address that.

Pupil behaviour is a problem. The Audit Commission report ''Going Places'' states:

''There are also significant opportunities to increase bus travel as an alternative to the school run. Behavioural problems on school and public transport are, for example, one reason why some parents prefer to take their children to and from school by car, but better bus services could reduce the car mileage associated with the school run.''

There is a tension there. If we want more parents to send their child on the school bus, we need to ensure that the behaviour of the children using those buses is of a high standard. In the Government's response to the Education and Skills Committee report, they said that if a child is excluded from a school bus the LEA has to pay the cost of transporting that child to school. Therefore, there is a financial disincentive to the LEA excluding a child from a school bus. It would have to pay for a taxi or find some other means of transport to get the child who is misbehaving on a school bus to school.

There is no incentive for the LEA to exclude children who are misbehaving—putting at risk the lives of other pupils on that bus or damaging equipment on it. It is time we took a much firmer line on the issue. It should not be the LEA that has to pick up the cost of children misbehaving on school buses by providing them with a taxi. We should be saying that the parents of those children should pay the cost of getting them to school. They should take responsibility for ensuring that their children get to school. Where a child is excluded from travelling on a school bus because of misbehaviour, the parents should pay, not the LEA.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

I have a lot of sympathy with what the hon. Gentleman has said; there are considerable behavioural problems on school buses in my constituency. However, I am interested in the wording of his amendment No.48, because it suggests to me that the LEA would have no discretion in excluding a pupil for bad behaviour; in cases of poor behaviour there would be an automatic exclusion. Would it not be better if the LEA had the right to exclude, but could judge each case on its merits?

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

If the Government accepted the spirit of the amendment, the wording could be finessed to cope with that point. Many schools can already exercise discretion in excluding pupils for poor behaviour. The wording of the amendment need not deter the Minister from accepting its spirit, and perhaps tabling amendments on Report to reflect that.

It is fundamental that we tell parents that they are responsible if their child misbehaves on a bus, to the extent that the child is excluded from using school transport and they must pick up the financial cost, so that local authorities or schools feel that they have the discretion to expel children without having to carry the financial costs of doing so. That is the thinking behind amendment No. 48. If we are to encourage greater use of school transport, we need to tackle behaviour, to prevent the sort of accident that took place in the Vale of Glamorgan a couple of years ago, which the hon. Member for Monmouth mentioned. This is an important issue, we need to tackle it and the Bill provides the opportunity.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

The amendments are all well intentioned and stress that safety is paramount—as indeed it is. When people hand their children over to a school transport arrangement, they want them to return

safely, and to have a pleasant journey. Some of the amendments appear to put markers down and signpost the importance of safety in a general sense. At least one amendment adds some red meat to the Bill.

Amendment No.29, which specifies safe embarking rules, seeks to add other duties into the school transport scheme arrangements. Everybody is sympathetic to that. People recognise that children must get safely on and off buses. That is obviously a critical time, when children may run away from the back of buses and so on, and accidents will happen.

However, I am not entirely clear whether some of what is being required is already implied in the general duties of schools to their pupils when schools run their own buses, or whether it is generally implied in transport law. Maybe the Minister can assist me. If it is not implied, it remains unclear to me whether in the process of introducing pilots one ought to seek to amend the general transport law as it applies across the land. However, the spirit of the proposal is sound. It is commendable and everybody ought to take it on board.

As I understand it, amendment No. 25 seeks to add the word ''safe'' after the word ''suitable''. There is nothing wrong with that per se, but it seems to be open to the objection that when one says ''suitable'', that means safe as well, so the addition is to some extent redundant. It points something out, but it does not say anything that is not already implied by ''suitable''.

Amendment No. 26 would insert the word ''safe'' before the phrase

''walking distance of his home''

in paragraph 3(1)(a) of new schedule 35B. The intent is commendable, but it seems that the amendment would give the green light for authorities to renege on providing school transport schemes when there are perfectly safe, but inordinately long, routes to a school. It would point local authorities towards addressing the transport needs of people who have to take perilous routes, rather than the needs of those who have to take extraordinarily long routes.

I am sorry if I have misunderstood the intention of the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young), but that seems a corollary or consequence of what has been said. The Bill intends to allow local authorities the flexibility to cater not only for pupils who have relatively dangerous journeys to school, but for those who have extraordinarily long and arduous journeys to school. I would hate us to find, after the Bill has been passed, that children who have to travel 20 miles on perfectly safe roads had no school travel scheme to use.

I mentioned red meat, and amendment No. 48, which I thoroughly support, would add that to the Bill. I see no reason why a local authority should provide transport for pupils who, for whatever reason, imperil the safety of other people and make school transport a less attractive proposition. An excluded pupil can always make the decision to behave himself. We need provision for a system for reinstating a pupil when he decides to behave himself; as has been pointed out, a

certain amount of discretion should be given to the local authority. However, the fundamental principle that pupils who behave in such a way as to put the whole journey at risk ought not to be on school transport—and certainly should not be funded to take it—strikes me as eminently sound, and one that the Minister would be well advised to consider.

Huw Edwards (Labour, Monmouth)

I am sympathetic to the spirit of the amendment—but who would determine whether a pupil was acting in an unruly way, when there might be no supervision on the bus other than by the driver? I do not doubt that many pupils do act in such a way; that was drawn to my attention when I went to a school council meeting in Caerleon recently.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

With all punitive decisions somebody has to decide; otherwise no punishment would take place. Obviously we need a fair system, but the fact that such a system might not be perfect, but simply satisfactory, is no argument for not having a system at all.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

I shall deal with the amendments in three sections, and I shall keep my remarks brief. I shall speak first to amendments Nos. 29 and 47. The right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire pointed out that the Bill provides an opportunity to improve quality and safety, and then asked, perfectly properly, whether the Government are entirely neutral on that. I reassure him and the Committee that we are not entirely neutral; I see this Bill, and the school travel schemes that go with it, as an opportunity for us to enhance a series of different arrangements, such as the quality and safety of the transport options available, including buses.

At the moment, as the right hon. Gentleman pointed out, provisions vary enormously in different parts of the country. We know that seat belts have to be provided on all school trips, and that when LEAs contract for buses, they can specify that belts should be provided. Increasingly LEAs do so, as is shown by the positive example of the Staffordshire yellow buses. However, that does not happen everywhere, and we have an opportunity. The prospectus asks local education authorities to set out safety and quality arrangements, but in the light of this important debate, I give the Committee an undertaking that we will consider further the message that the prospectus sends out on safety, which is so fundamental and central to school transport, and to school buses in particular.

Amendment No. 29 would add a specific reference to ensure safe means of embarking and disembarking from school transport. Amendment No. 47 seeks to provide more generally that a school travel scheme may include arrangements to ensure the safety of transport under a scheme. As the relevant part of the Bill stands, those are:

''arrangements for the provision of transport . . . payment of the whole or any part of . . . reasonable travelling expenses, and . . . arrangements to facilitate or promote . . . different ways of travelling.''

I do not think it necessary to include specific reference to safety when alighting from or boarding a bus. Such arrangements are integral to the arrangements for the provision of transport under sub-paragraph (2)(a).

There is no need to mention them separately, especially as the sub-paragraph contains a non-exhaustive list of things that a scheme may contain, not a fully comprehensive list. Furthermore, the amendment would not guarantee that the arrangements were included in every scheme.

I believe that amendment No. 47, too, is unnecessary because, as was suggested by the hon. Member for Southport, safety is already an implicit requirement. Paragraph 3 of the new schedule refers to

''suitable arrangements . . . for . . . transport to and from school.''

Arrangements could not be suitable if they were not safe. Indeed, the meaning of ''suitable'' in such a context has been considered in the courts, and it was held that it is implicit that LEAs have a duty to provide safe transport. The courts held that the LEA's duty is to make such arrangements for transport as it considers necessary for the child

''to reach school without undue stress, strain or difficulty such as would prevent him from benefiting from the education the school has to offer, just as it must be to make such arrangements as it considers necessary for him to travel in safety and in reasonable comfort''.

Huw Edwards (Labour, Monmouth)

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for the clarification of that legal decision. Does he therefore believe that having contracts that, by their nature, require overcrowding would be unsuitable, and that such contracts should not be entered into?

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

Of course I accept that. The debate is about the definition of overcrowding. We will return to the specific issue that my hon. Friend mentioned—the three-for-two rule—at a later stage.

In our response to the Transport Committee's report on school transport, we reiterated the point that

''It is illegal for anyone to use a vehicle on the road if it does not meet at least the minimum roadworthiness standards prescribed in legislation.''

Of course we want to go beyond that, and there will be important opportunities for us to do so. As we all know, absolute safety does not exist. Safer arrangements can be achieved by various means. What is clear from the debate is that we need to use every mechanism available to us to achieve greater safety. We believe that the prospectus is the best vehicle for that. It will encourage LEAs to submit bids for pilot schemes to consider new approaches to transport safety issues. In light of that I ask my hon. Friend and the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire not to press their amendments.

I move on to related amendment No. 25, which was also tabled by the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire. It too raises the question of inserting the word ''safe''. As I said, the meaning of ''suitable'' school transport has been considered by the courts and it was held that LEAs have a duty to provide safe transport for children of compulsory school age who attend their nearest suitable school.

I shall give the Committee some detail on that. Cases decided in 1989 and 1992 determine that an LEA's duty is to make the arrangements for transport that it considers necessary for a child, as I set out in response to the previous amendment. I therefore ask the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire not to press

his amendment, as I hope that I have given sufficient assurance to him and to the Committee that safety is central not only in existing case law and legislation, but in the intention behind the programme and the Bill.

I believe that amendment No. 48, tabled by those on the Opposition Front Bench, raises a central issue, as we heard in some of the earlier discussion. It seeks to introduce a power for local education authorities to withdraw entitlement to school transport in scheme areas where the behaviour of a pupil puts at risk the safety of other pupils using the same transport. The amendment would not extend that power to LEAs that were not part of the scheme.

I agree with what the hon. Member for Fareham said. Poor behaviour by pupils on school transport is an extremely serious issue. I welcome the opportunity to put on record and clarify the present position. The consequences of poor behaviour can be wide-ranging, as several contributions to the debate have already pointed out. There is an impact on other passengers, and in extreme cases tragic death or serious injury can result from such behaviour. It is perhaps not surprising that this is not the first occasion on which this important issue has been raised.

In the joint DFES and Department for Transport document ''Travelling to School: an action plan'' a number of actions for schools and LEAs were included in relation to this issue. The action plan asks each school to promote positive behaviour by pupils on their journey to and from school through rewarding positive behaviour and using sanctions to address poor behaviour, which I shall come to in a moment. Guidance for schools on behaviour on school transport is contained in key stage 3 behaviour and attendance materials.

As I am sure all hon. Members would agree, schools recognise that positive behaviour on the journey can help to enhance the school's reputation. Often the school's local reputation will be based more on the behaviour of pupils than on any other factor. We expect schools to work with the police, bus operators and the local community to promote best behaviour.

We also expect LEAs and transport authorities to tackle antisocial behaviour in a range of different ways, such as driver training and working with schools on an agreed approach. I would like to praise the work done by Essex county council, which found that a behaviour liaison officer and escorts, together with driver training, led to reduced vandalism and less bad behaviour. A number of authorities in Wales are also piloting the use of CCTV on routes that have been identified as prone to behaviour problems, and the results so far are encouraging.

Poor behaviour on buses is an issue that has been raised by LEAs. We are aware of cases where children eligible for free school transport have misbehaved consistently while travelling to or from school, and some authorities have adopted a policy of withdrawing transport, either for a temporary period or permanently, for more serious or persistent cases of misbehaviour. The intention is for such sanctions to be a deterrent, and it is hoped that that they would rarely

need to be invoked. It is important to signal to pupils and parents—and we can do so on a cross-party basis today—that behaviour which endangers other pupils, or indeed the driver and other passengers, will not be tolerated.

We understand that there may be a degree of confusion surrounding what can and cannot be done in terms of sanctions for poor behaviour on the school bus. Part of the confusion lies with the interplay between the provision of school transport and the law surrounding school attendance. Section 444(4) of the 1996 Act describes the circumstances in which the parent of a pupil of compulsory school age will have a defence to the charge of failing to secure that child's regular attendance at school.

Effectively, a parent of a child attending their nearest suitable school and living outside the statutory walking distance would have a defence against a charge for non-attendance if transport were not provided. However, the offence is having a child who fails to attend school regularly. If a child were banned from the school bus for a day, or perhaps even a week, the LEA would not be able to prosecute for non-attendance under section 444. That means that an LEA could withdraw access to transport temporarily without having to consider whether alternative transport should be provided.

Regarding the legal position where the withdrawal of transport would result in the child failing to attend school regularly, our legal advice is that there may be circumstances in which the LEA has no legal obligation to provide alternative transport. Section 444(4) of the 1996 Act means that the LEA has to make suitable transport arrangements if it wants to retain the ability to prosecute the parents for failure to attend regularly. However, that is not the same as saying that it has a legal obligation to provide the transport.

In the circumstances that we are considering, the LEA would not be saying that transport was not necessary and should not be provided, but that—this is the crucial point—transport was necessary and suitable transport had been provided, but that the child's behaviour was such that he could not take advantage of it. That has not been stated clearly enough before, which is why I have taken some time to place it firmly on the record that that is our understanding of the case, and that defence exists in such circumstances.

That puts the onus back on to the parents under section 7 of the 1996 Act. Our guidance on exclusion from school clearly states:

''Pupils' behaviour in the immediate vicinity of the school or on a journey to or from school can . . . be grounds for exclusion.''

Most people agree that poor behaviour on transport needs addressing through a variety of means. I hope that I have given the hon. Member for Fareham and the Committee some assurance that, under the existing powers there is the ability to achieve the result that he rightly urged on the Committee. In the light of my comments, I ask my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford to withdraw the amendment.

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

My hon. Friend the Minister was right to say that the provision to which my amendment relates deals with permissive arrangements that local authorities could make if they so wanted, but would not have to make as a mandatory duty. I wanted to draw to the attention of local authorities the safety issue involving school buses so the record of the debate will do that job for me. I was pleased that my hon. Friend said that the provision related to all forms of transport. Clearly, the Government would not want local authorities to tempt pupils out of cars into walking or cycling to school only for casualty figures to go up, not down. I am sure that my hon. Friend will have close regard to safety information. I was convinced that he was right when he said that the way to approach such matters is to improve the prospectus, which at present contains little on safety, and given his assurance that he will improve the prospectus, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I beg to move amendment No. 53, in

clause 1, page 2, line 12, at end insert—

'(3) A school travel scheme must include arrangements to ensure that any person engaged in driving or escorting a child with special educational needs or a disability to and from school shall be required to have an enhanced Criminal Records Bureau check before they start work.

(4) A school travel scheme must include arrangements to ensure that any person engaged in driving or escorting a child with special educational needs or a disability to and from school shall be required to receive appropriate disability equality training.'.

Frank Cook (Labour, Stockton North)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following amendments:

No. 57, in

clause 1, page 2, line 30, at end insert—

'Children with mobility difficulties

3A (1) If a child has mobility difficulties, the scheme authority must provide transport to and from the school at which he is a registered pupil, regardless of whether the child lives inside the walking distance as defined in section 444(5).

(2) For the purposes of this paragraph ''mobility difficulties'' means that a child cannot walk to and from school with safety and reasonable comfort because of his special educational needs or disability.'.

No. 58, in

clause 1, page 2, line 36, leave out from 'scheme' to end of line and insert—

'(a) for a protected child is provided free of charge; and

(b) for a child with a disability or special educational needs that incurs additional expense, and where this provision is necessary because a child has a disability or special educational need, is paid for by the scheme authority.'.

No. 44, in

clause 1, page 3, line 4, at end insert

', or

'(e) who has mobility problems which are certified by a doctor and who lives within the statutory walking distance to the nearest suitable school.'.

No. 46, in

clause 1, page 3, line 4, at end insert

', or

'(g) who is a child with special educational needs attending a school which is deemed to be suitable by virtue of the provision made for particular needs.'.

No. 60, in

clause 1, page 3, line 41, at end insert—

'(c) report to the appropriate national authority annually concerning the impact of the school travel scheme on children with special educational needs and on disabled children, including the number of such children for whom transport to and from school is currently provided by that scheme authority and what charges, if any, have been made for transport provided to such children.'.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

Part of this group of amendments relates to our debate on school transport safety. It also involves issues facing children with special educational needs and how such children will be affected by the Bill—a topic that was raised on several occasions by, among others, the hon. Member for Wimbledon (Roger Casale), on Second Reading. I wish to tackle amendment No. 53 in two parts. First I shall talk about escort arrangements and disability training, before referring to the impact of some provisions on children with special educational needs.

As for people involved in driving or escorting children with special educational needs to and from school, many groups that deal with such children have asked who is undertaking such duties and what checks are in place. Many helplines operated by such organisations receive calls about drivers and escorts. We know about the extensive use of taxis or minibuses to take children to special schools. Some children who attend special schools have difficulty in communicating with others, so they are particularly vulnerable to threats. The Special Educational Consortium is aware of incidents when children with special educational needs have been subjected to verbal or physical abuse on the journey to and from school. Its major concern is that, because many such children lack the ability to communicate with their parents, abuses sometimes go undetected.

The amendment would ensure that drivers and escorts underwent enhanced Criminal Records Bureau checks before they could drive or escort a child to a special school. Without those checks, many people involved in organisations concerned with special educational needs are worried that children lack the protection of the law. The Special Educational Consortium has cited a couple of examples. Child A has a severe learning disability and is driven to and from school in a minicab. Her mother noticed that on certain days, her daughter would arrive back late from school, disturbed and upset. It turned out that the girl had been subject to abuse by the driver. Another parent contacted an SEC member helpline to say that the escort had displayed inappropriate behaviour towards a number of children. She had delayed her CRB check, which enabled her to work unsupervised and unmonitored for a number of weeks. The parents' concern was that their complaints about the escort were ignored by the LEA.

There is strong demand among parents of children with special educational needs and the organisations that represent them for CRB checks to be made before the journey can take place. A driver might call in sick and a relief driver might be put on the route—a relief

driver who would not need a CRB check, yet who might pose a great risk to a child. That is the sort of issue that we need to address.

The second part of amendment No. 53 is about equality training, to make the escorts and drivers aware of some of the issues that affect children with special educational needs. It is important that anyone who works with SEN children understands the nature and impact of their disability or condition. A lack of awareness about a child's condition can put that child at risk. One need only think about some of the issues connected with children with autism, who lack a sense of danger. They are at particular risk if the escort and driver do not realise that that is an aspect of the condition.

We need to ensure that, as far as possible, the drivers and escorts are aware of the needs of the children that they look after, and training in disability awareness would help to equip them with the skills that they need to manage pupils with particular disabilities or special educational needs. Such training would also enhance the protection of children at risk in those situations, and the safety of the children who use that form of transport to get to their special school or special provision.

I now move on to the broader issue of free transport for many such children. On Second Reading, the Secretary of State helpfully gave the commitment that free transport would continue for children for whom transport was specified as part of their statement. That reassurance was welcomed in the House on that day. I think that the Secretary of State said that an amendment might be brought forward at some point to help to enshrine that in the Bill. However, there is a problem attached to the limited protection that the Secretary of State outlined.

The first issue is that the Government's strategy for tackling children with special educational needs talks about moving away from statements. The Government want to create a relationship of trust between the parent and the LEA. They want fewer statements to be issued, recognising many parents' concerns about the time taken to get a statement, the whole assessment procedure, and the challenge that the statements go through. However, if a parent's only legal protection for free school transport is the transport element of a statement, parents will push far harder for a statement that includes specific reference to their transport needs.

The limited protection that the Secretary of State gave works against children with special educational needs, and the Government's policy goal of moving away from statements. That is a tension that needs to be recognised in the prospectus or the Bill. However, a number of children do not have statements, or have statements in which free transport for school is not specified. We need to look carefully at the protection for those children. In amendments Nos. 44 and 46, which I tabled, I have tried to outline situations in which that protection of free school transport could be given.

Some children attend a unit, such as the one for children with speech problems that I visited in Leatherhead yesterday. Children were being taken on 20-minute taxi journeys from outside the catchment area to attend that unit, which attracted pupils from across Surrey. For many of those pupils that is the suitable school, because it gives them the help and support that they need. If we are saying that a school is suitable for tackling particular conditions or disabilities, should we not say that free school transport should extend to the pupils who attend that school on the grounds of its suitability? In my constituency there are two units attached to schools for children with hearing impairment. I would like to see some protection for children being transported to those schools from elsewhere, including Fareham and the surrounding area, to make use of its specialist facilities.

If we are to encourage inclusion in mainstream schools and we want children to benefit from the specialist facilities available in them, we need to consider the transport implications. The increased provision of specialist units attached to schools indicates that we should be moving in that direction.

There are other areas to consider, too. The National Autistic Society and the Parents Autism Campaign for Education—PACE—gave evidence about some of the issues facing children with autism. A recent NAS survey said that

''well over half . . . of those caring for a person with autism described using transport as difficult for those they cared for, with 11% of carers surveyed indicating that transport triggered behavioural difficulties.''

If as a consequence of the Bill, there is more movement away from specialist transport for children with autism, that would affect other children using school buses, because of the problems that arise.

Many children with an autistic spectrum disorder experience oversensitivity to different sensory stimuli, including light, noise and touch. Children with autism find unstructured time difficult and may be anxious, due to bullying, or disruption to a routine on the way back from school. There is a need to ensure that transport is provided for them, but the Bill might undermine that. We recognise that the cost of SEN transport is two-thirds of the school transport budget and is a visible target for LEAs seeking to reduce costs when their budgets are under pressure, but those costs involve vulnerable children who need support. Transport is both an easy target and one of the most difficult costs for an LEA to cover.

The Education and Skills Committee and the Transport Committee touched on that matter. Having read the Government's response to the Education and Skills Committee's report, I am concerned that their assurances are slightly anodyne, and could be firmer to give more guidance to scheme authorities. Paragraph 22 of the response says:

''We agree that there will always be some pupils with''

special educational needs

''who will need individual transport, and we also agree that changes to travel arrangements for pupils with SEN need to be planned carefully.''

Those are warm words, but parents and organisations working with children with special educational needs require more reassurance than the Government's response provides. The other Government responses to the special educational needs section of the Education and Skills Committee's report were equally bland.

If we are to tackle the concerns of the special educational needs groups—and those of the parents and children whom they represent—we need better guidance in the Bill on who is entitled to free school transport. How far do we go beyond the people who are entitled to it as a consequence of their SEN statement, and how do we ensure that we encourage or enable as many children as possible to access the specialist support that they need, without their parents feeling that there is a financial penalty for doing so?

Roger Casale (Labour, Wimbledon)

I shall speak to amendments Nos. 57, 58 and 60, tabled in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud and to amendment No. 53, which was tabled by the hon. Member for Fareham.

We are moving into one of the most difficult and sensitive areas of the Bill, and as we do so, part of me says, ''Quit while you're up.'' We addressed some of these issues in an earlier part of the debate. Some of the issues that we are trying to address through the amendments can be examined in relation to the enhanced consultation between service users and local authorities that we are going to try to bring about.

As I have said before, the transport of children with special educational needs involves not only vulnerable children, but vulnerable children who could be placed in a vulnerable situation. The situation described by the hon. Member for Fareham—a child with special educational needs being abused—is not at all far-fetched. In fact, there have been such cases, and they can happen again. That brings to mind awful nightmare scenarios. We must remember that the way things are at the moment, parents of children with special educational needs have to face those nightmares and uncertainties every day.

It is also important to point out that there is currently rather an open door for individuals who are intent on abusing children to infiltrate minicab firms and get themselves appointed as escorts for vulnerable children. As the Committee continues its work and as the Bill progresses through the House we have an opportunity to close that door, and we have a responsibility to do so.

On the face of it, the amendment looks attractive. However, we must ask ourselves whether we are trying to use a sledgehammer to crack a nut. I described a situation in my local authority area involving non-compliance with Criminal Records Bureau checks. The problem was not the nature of the checks, but the fact that they were not being done in the first place. We must ask ourselves whether making the system even more bureaucratic and enhancing the requirements covering Criminal Records Bureau checks will deal

with the problem. We need to consider the measure, but I want to see that door closed, and the problem resolved.

As I understand it, a lack of communication between service providers and service users is at the heart of the problem. That leads to a lack of confidence on the part of service users. We must examine how we can get to a situation where the existing legal requirements and the mechanisms for criminal records checks are properly enacted. That is in addition to thinking about how we can enhance that system. I await with great interest what emerges from the passage of the Bill on enhanced consultation on this issue. There is a serious problem and we must address it.

Inevitably when one raises a constituency issues, one draws the attention of national bodies. I am grateful to the Special Educational Consortium, which includes the National Autistic Society, Mencap, Scope, the Royal National Institute of the Blind and the Parents Autism Campaign for Education. I pay tribute to those organisations, which are the first port of call for many people who face such problems every day. We

must listen carefully to them. The Minister mentioned the work that they did in bringing forward amendments during the pre-legislative scrutiny. They have also helped my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud and me to devise the amendments that we have tabled.

Amendment No. 57 would ensure that schemes make provision for children with mobility difficulties who live within statutory walking distance of their school. Amendment No. 58 would ensure that a child with special educational needs and/or a disability would not incur any financial penalty as a consequence of that disability. A disabled child would not be charged for transport services that they needed to meet their additional needs, irrespective of whether that provision was detailed in the statement.

I will leave it to my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud to discuss those amendments further. I would like—

It being twenty-five minutes past Eleven o'clock, The Chairman adjourned the Committee without Question put, pursuant to the Standing Order.

Adjourned till this day at half-past Two o'clock.

Standing Committee A

Clause 1 - School travel schemes

Bill O'Brien (Labour, Normanton)

I remind the Committee that with this we are taking the following amendments:

No. 57, in

clause 1, page 2, line 30, at end insert—

'Children with mobility difficulties

3A (1) If a child has mobility difficulties, the scheme authority must provide transport to and from the school at which he is a registered pupil, regardless of whether the child lives inside the walking distance as defined in section 444(5).

(2) For the purposes of this paragraph ''mobility difficulties'' means that a child cannot walk to and from school with safety and reasonable comfort because of his special educational needs or disability.'.

No. 58, in

clause 1, page 2, line 36, leave out from 'scheme' to end of line and insert—

'(a) for a protected child is provided free of charge; and

(b) for a child with a disability or special educational needs that incurs additional expense, and where this provision is necessary because a child has a disability or special educational need, is paid for by the scheme authority.'.

No. 44, in

clause 1, page 3, line 4, at end insert

', or

'(e) who has mobility problems which are certified by a doctor and who lives within the statutory walking distance to the nearest suitable school.'.

No. 46, in

clause 1, page 3, line 4, at end insert

', or

'(g) who is a child with special educational needs attending a school which is deemed to be suitable by virtue of the provision made for particular needs.'.

No. 60, in

clause 1, page 3, line 41, at end insert—

'(c) report to the appropriate national authority annually concerning the impact of the school travel scheme on children with special educational needs and on disabled children, including the number of such children for whom transport to and from school is currently provided by that scheme authority and what charges, if any, have been made for transport provided to such children.'.

Roger Casale (Labour, Wimbledon)

I welcome you to the Committee, Mr. O'Brien, and I look forward to working under your chairmanship.

Before the Committee adjourned this morning, I explained why I supported the spirit of amendment No. 53, tabled by the hon. Member for Fareham (Mr. Hoban), and of amendments Nos. 57 and 58, tabled in my name and that of my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Mr. Drew). We were enjoying quite a degree of cross-party consensus, having identified very serious flaws and deficiencies in the way the legislation is currently drafted in relation to protection, in particular of vulnerable children—those with special educational needs—and their transportation to school. However, while I was voicing my support for the spirit of those amendments, I was also encouraged by the prospect that we will address these matters again during the progress of the Bill, as the specific measures proposed in the amendments may not be the best and most effective way of dealing with the serious problem that, fortunately, we all now agree exists and needs to be dealt with.

Amendments Nos. 57 and 58 are probing amendments, and I am pleased to have the opportunity to probe further in relation to amendment No. 53, but I first want to comment briefly on amendment No. 60. However we decide to resolve the problems that have been identified in relation to the safety of children with special educational needs travelling between school and home, I am clear that there is a need for constant monitoring at a national level of what happens in different situations around the country. It may well be the case that the solution lies at the local level and not, as amendment No. 53 proposes, with the improved bureaucracy required to enhance criminal records checks. However, we cannot simply leave the problem to be sorted out at the local level and walk away from it. We must have a process whereby we continuously monitor whether what is happening at the local level is up to the standards that we wish.

Amendment No. 60 would do just that. It would ensure both that scheme authorities operating such transport schemes report to national authorities on how school travel schemes have affected disabled children and those with SEN, and that the appropriate national authority has the information that is necessary to determine whether the school travel scheme is having a positive or a detrimental impact on disabled children and those with SEN—who, as we have seen, are particularly vulnerable. In turn, that information would allow the appropriate national authority to make an informed decision as to whether the scheme should be allowed to continue or be revoked. Given that the scheme authority should collect the information required by the amendment as

a matter of course, it should not impose any excessive bureaucratic burden, but it would ensure greater accountability.

I hope that the Minister will give appropriate attention to the need to have proper accountability at the national level, even though we are likely to look to the local level to deliver the improvements we need.

David Drew (Labour/Co-operative, Stroud)

I rise to support my hon. Friend's comments. I wish to make a couple of observations about this group of amendments. As my hon. Friend intimated both before and after the Committee's short intermission, the intention is to try to ascertain from the Government that there are some lines of security, so that we know that we are not going to tamper unduly with the funding mechanism, specifically with regard to the physical or mental needs of special needs children when they travel to school. If such children have to travel further because they have a specialist education, they must not be penalised for that. There is an unwritten agreement on that across local authorities. I do not know of any authorities that would deliberately penalise a child with a particular need by loading them with additional transport costs.

Choice is a word that some of us have fears about, but these days it is part of our vocabulary as politicians. I would not want it to be seen that parents could be deemed at least partly responsible for making a choice, based on whether they could afford to supplement transport costs, about whether their child should go to a better and more specialist provider. I would like the Minister to allay such fears and assure us that there will not be any charging mechanism that will be predisposed to consider means as a way of deciding on appropriate special needs education.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that it is not only through choice that parents might be required to pay more for school transport? If an education authority sought to reorganise the provision of special schools, as is the case in Gloucestershire at the moment, parents might have no choice but to pay more if schools were closed and provision was made further away from home.

David Drew (Labour/Co-operative, Stroud)

I could respond by referring to my local area; I get on well with the hon. Member for Tewkesbury (Mr. Robertson), but we do not see eye to eye on this issue. I agree with that intervention. In my first intervention, I said that I considered reorganisation to be crucial and that there ought to be proper consultation on transport availability, and I have not changed my mind. It is crucial that no implication of disadvantage—that is, having to pay—should be linked to an arrangement agreed to by the parent if they thought that such an arrangement was the only sensible thing to come out of the reorganisation. One of the problems is that we tend to consider transport after reorganisation has happened, rather than considering it, and whether there are different ways of providing it, as one of the issues. I have always believed—I am careful not to go off the

point, Mr. O'Brien—that, whenever possible, any form of education and support for people with disabilities is better provided locally. That way, the family structure can be kept in place. However, that is not always possible and on occasions people's special needs will mean that they have to travel or be domiciled elsewhere.

I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister will get the drift of what we say. We do not want to derail anything; the Government are listening, and I have been impressed by the consensual nature of the debate on what we are trying to do, which is to allow an experiment to take place, but with certain red lines so that parents do not feel that they will be made more vulnerable in what they face on behalf of their children because of a charging mechanism that is used in a punitive way.

I hope that the Minister will accept the spirit in which the amendments were tabled. In the wider community, there is concern among the disability organisations with which my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon (Roger Casale) and I have been in contact. We want an assurance so that we can know that the right decisions will be taken for the right reasons, and that money will not be used as a stick.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

It was a morning of remarkable consensus, Mr. O'Brien, particularly on how much we were looking forward to your chairmanship.

This is one of the biggest parts of the legislation that affects a large number of people with children with disabilities or special educational needs who have a stake in school transport. As far as everybody is concerned, those people also represent a critical section of the funding provided for school transport. Disability or special educational needs means two things with regard to school transport: first, there are longer distances to travel to an appropriate school and, secondly, there is genuine difficulty in travelling, whether or not that school is near or far. Both conditions can apply. However, given that disability kicks in like that and affects a key, vulnerable section of our community, we would all accept that people so affected should not have to pay for their condition. They should not have to pay for needing to go to a school that is further away, or for any difficulty in travelling that they experience as disabled people.

I think that the Government and the Opposition would agree about that—and if they did there would be that famed consensus—but the issue is whether the consensus is adequately reflected in the Bill. The Secretary of State has made the commitment that transport can be contained in a statement if it is essential for a child's education. However, the hon. Member for Fareham has also said—and I mentioned it on Second Reading—that the current philosophy of the Government is not so statement-driven, particularly when a more conciliatory, negotiated path is taken towards meeting special needs in other areas.

There is also a feeling on the part of many groups dealing with disabilities of all kinds that statements by themselves may not catch all and may not be sufficiently inclusive to cater for all deserving cases.

There is anxiety and doubt as to whether the basic principle that people should not have to pay to access education because of their disability is as sufficiently and securely enshrined in the Bill as it ought to be. It is easy to see where that anxiety is coming from, because people have considered the costs and looked at the cost pressures on local authorities and seen that there will be an understandable temptation to get those costs down. To some extent, under the guise of integration, which is a laudable desire, there might even be some poor provision smuggled in or disguised. That is a worry that the Minister could rectify by sharpening up the Bill and accepting some of the amendments.

I shall go into some of the detail in speaking to amendment No. 53, which has the laudable ambition of bringing in checks on the background of people who provide transport. Surely, nobody can fundamentally disagree with that; indeed, they must agree that that is done properly and effectively. The amendment also contains a specification, about which we have not spoken, that we should train transport providers. That is particularly welcomed by lobby groups, such as the autism groups, which recognise that dealing with people with such a disability is a skilled task, and understanding the needs and requirements of children with a range of abilities is fairly problematic. That is a laudable ambition, but I wonder whether, given the lack of supply of school transport, that need could be met overnight, or even met effectively in a reasonably short time scale, because many of the people on whom we rely at the moment are ordinary—but quite reliable and decent—taxi drivers, and the like. Amendment No. 53 raises some interesting points that are worthy of debate and consideration, and I would not want to say anything against the spirit in which it is moved.

Amendment No. 60 is almost essential. We want adequate reports on pilots from the point of view of special education and disability, and we must be mindful that we sometimes see best practice in pilots but on a further roll-out there is some deterioration and cutting of corners. We cannot always argue that there will be wholesale successful practice across the country if pilots are successful. However, there is no case for not monitoring the pilots adequately and fully.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

I join colleagues on both sides of the Committee in welcoming you to the chairmanship of the Committee, Mr. O'Brien.

I would like first to speak to amendment No. 53 and then to make some general remarks about the other amendments in this group. Like all those who have spoken in this discussion, I accept that we have now come to perhaps the trickiest part of the proposal that we are putting before the House. The Committee's full consideration of the matter, the number of amendments tabled on it, and the wider public concern—of which we will all be aware—reflect that fact. I am confident that we can consider the issue well

today, but I also recognise that we will need to return to the subject at a later stage of the Bill's progress through this House and the other place.

On amendment No. 53, both the hon. Member for Fareham and my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon have put their case strongly. I particularly congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon, who has been campaigning on the issue for some time locally, both in his constituency of Wimbledon and in the London borough of Merton. He has also raised the issue directly with Ministers and on the Floor of the House, and has raised it again today. He is giving a clear message that is absolutely relevant to the Bill: if the proposals before us are to work, they have to do so at the local level, but for them to work at the local level, there needs to be the most effective system of monitoring nationally. I certainly want to take away that message from this discussion, and I shall return to it soon.

The amendment would insert two new sub-paragraphs. One would require enhanced criminal background checks to be conducted on those driving or escorting children with SEN or disabilities before they start work, and the other would require such staff to receive disability equality training. As with a number of the issues that we discussed earlier, both the sub-paragraphs address important matters and focus in particular on the well-being of some of our most vulnerable school pupils.

The subjects of the amendments—Criminal Records Bureau checks for drivers and escorts, and training in disability equality—are issues that I know cause concern to hon. Members on both sides of the House and certainly to the Government. However, my argument is that both matters are already and adequately addressed either in existing legislation or in good practice guidance. Notwithstanding that, I give the Committee an undertaking that, through the prospectus and the implementation of the Bill—if it is successful in both Houses—those matters will be absolutely taken into account.

Arrangements for pre-employment checks were the subject of detailed discussions between the Home Office and other Departments before the establishment of the current system for disclosing criminal record information, which is set out in the Police Act 1997. The Department for Education and Skills guidance on preventing unsuitable people from working with children and young people makes it absolutely clear that all applicants for positions that are excepted from the provisions of the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 should be asked to declare any convictions, cautions or bind-overs that they have incurred, including any that would be regarded as spent under the Act in other circumstances. That includes any position in which the normal duties include caring for, training, supervising or being in sole charge of children under the age of 18, and would certainly include both the taxi drivers and the escorts we are talking about.

In addition, taxi or private hire car drivers are subject to enhanced criminal record checks when they apply for a licence and each time they renew it. That is

not yet fully in operation for private hire vehicle drivers in London, but it will be by April 2006. Furthermore, the guidance to which I previously referred requires more than CRB checks to be carried out. I accept some of the concerns that have been raised about the CRB system not being watertight. Other checks are required before staff are recruited to work with children.

In addition to the CRB process, the guidance states clearly that potential employers should check an applicant's qualifications and references. That includes both professional and character references, and they should be checked direct from the referee and should include, importantly, the applicant's most recent employer. Potential employers should also look at an applicant's previous employment and should seek satisfactory explanations for gaps in their employment. If our guidance on recruitment is followed, and all those checks are carried out, including CRB checks, we shall be able to minimise the risks.

The hon. Member for Fareham made a specific and important point this morning about relief drivers. Our guidance makes it clear that relief drivers should also be checked before working with children. We advise that a pool of checked drivers are available to undertake relief duties. As for the first part of the amendment, I am confident that the necessary powers are in place. I accept what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon and the hon. Gentleman in that, for the powers to be fully used, we must ensure that the mechanisms available to us under the Bill and other provisions are used to best effect to ensure that that is happening at local level. I appreciate that that is not always the case and that more needs to be done in that respect.

The second part of the amendment relates to disability equality training. Escorts and drivers of children with disabilities need to have an appropriate understanding of a wide range of different issues and how circumstances can vary markedly from case to case. They range from training on the use of specialised equipment and how to administer certain forms of medication through to much broader issues in respect of disability equality and consideration of some of the barriers to involvement in society as well as some of the attitudes that can exclude disabled people.

The purpose behind the proposal of the hon. Member for Fareham is entirely laudable and one that I am sure all of us in Committee support. However, as with some of the matters we discussed earlier, my view is that we can best encourage disability equality training via the prospectus and other mechanisms that are available to us rather than adding the provision to the Bill. Nevertheless, I appreciate the Gentleman and his colleagues putting the issue before us because it reminds us of the importance of training being made available. However, in the light of what I have said, I ask the hon. Gentleman to withdraw the amendment.

The general effect of amendments Nos. 57, 58, 44, 46 and 60 is to ensure that pupils with mobility problems or special educational needs that prevent them from walking to school should have transport provided and that they will either be protected from charges or protected from charges that are higher than those that would affect their peer groups travelling to maintained schools. Amendment No. 60 relates to accountability. It would require LEAs to report on the effect that school travel schemes are having on children with special educational needs or disabilities in the scheme areas.

I agree with hon. Members that it is completely unreasonable for local education authorities, were they to do so, to expect children with severe mobility difficulties or certain other forms of special educational needs to walk to school. For many children, that is simply not possible. Those children should already be provided with transport, when it is needed. The Bill requires scheme authorities to make travel arrangements that they consider appropriate for each child. It cannot, of course, be appropriate to do anything other than to provide transport for a child who cannot reasonably walk even a short distance. I give an undertaking to the Committee to carry out further work in that area, as the majority of people accept that it would be unjust if families of children with mobility difficulties were to find themselves having to pay for transport for them to get to school. I am anxious for the Bill to have a workable definition that we could add to the category of protected children. I undertake to report back on that specific aspect of the group of amendments.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

If a child with mobility problems were integrated into a mainstream school, the Minister said that he would not be charged any more than a mainstream pupil. Presumably, however, he should be subsidised more than a mainstream pupil because there are difficulties in getting there. Does the Minister visualise a situation in which a travel scheme could occur in which two children—one able-bodied, the other disabled—attend the same mainstream school and are charged identical sums for accessing the school?

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

Yes, depending on the incomes and financial circumstances of their families. If that aspect—which we will come on to later—is left aside, the purpose of the amendment tabled by my hon. Friends the Members for Wimbledon and for Stroud is to recognise that sometimes additional costs can be incurred by those with special needs and to make the point that it is unreasonable for the cost of transport to school to be higher for children with special educational needs than for the child at the neighbouring home or desk who does not have those special needs.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

Is it correct that if, for example, the disabled child had to take a taxi whereas the able-bodied child could take the bus, the authority would look upon those cases differently in terms of their

scheme because of the increased cost, but if they could access the school in the same way—if they got on the same bus—there would not be a problem?

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

That is one part of the grey area that we are dealing with. I agree with the implication of the hon. Gentleman's words. The easiest way to think about this is to imagine two children who live next door to each other and study in the same class. If one of them has to go by taxi for reasons of disability or special educational needs and their neighbour can go on the bus, it seems unreasonable for the child with the disability or SEN to pay more simply because they travel by taxi. That is the issue I want us to consider further, and that is what I was referring to when I said we wanted to come back to the House with a workable definition.

It is generally accepted that SEN provision is a large and growing part of the school transport budget. On Second Reading, the figure of 65 per cent. was used by the Shadow Secretary of State for Education and Skills, the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Mr. Collins). We dispute that figure; we think it is a bit lower, at about 40 per cent. Nevertheless, it is a substantial part of the spend.

We also know that the situation varies considerably from place to place and that SEN covers a broad spectrum of circumstances, as the hon. Member for Southport (Dr. Pugh) mentioned. Pupils with statements of special educational needs may well have highly specialised transport needs; there may be oxygen dependency, or a requirement for measures to prevent pupils with brittle bone disease from sustaining injuries. In those cases, the statement will usually set out the type of transport that is needed, and the LEA will have to provide it free of charge.

Those are the simple cases where there is no dispute. I doubt that parents will apply for statements purely to become entitled to free school transport. The process of statementing is based on educational need, and applications are driven by a range of factors; it is unlikely that applications driven purely by the desire for free transport provision would go very far.

In other cases, pupils with special educational needs will be able to attend a mainstream school alongside their peers and share the same mode of transport. Pupils with severe dyslexia may fall into that category, as may some pupils who are blind or deaf if there is good provision in their local schools. We would expect pupils with those needs to be treated in the same way as their mainstream peers, although they may need escorts. Where there is a charging regime, we would expect equality of treatment. Indeed, we would encourage that because independent travel for pupils with SEN is often vital to their later life chances in terms of employment and full integration into society during adult life.

Those are the two ends of the spectrum and they are relatively easy to agree on. We come now to children in the middle of the spectrum, which is more difficult territory. Some pupils with special educational needs will have to travel to special schools or mainstream schools that have specialised units attached—indeed, this issue has already been raised. In those cases,

children may have to travel a significant distance to a suitable school, whereas there is a mainstream school within easy walking distance. I fully understand that parents in such circumstances may think that charges are unfair. However, we do not want to get into a position where we prescribe that pupils will automatically receive free transport to school. That could have some unintended consequences: for example, it could invalidate a family's claim for a Motability car. What is important about the proposals is that flexibility is at the heart of them so that arrangements can be made that suit the individual circumstances of children and their families.

As I have hinted, amendment No.58, which stands in the name of my two hon. Friends, provides us with the possible basis for a solution that at least meets some of the concerns that have been raised. They were followed up in the exchange with the hon. Member for Southport just now.

The provision for pupils with special educational needs is an important area and for that reason the prospectus requires scheme applicants to set out their arrangements for such pupils. That is an area that we will need to scrutinise carefully when we examine scheme applications. I cannot accept that every child with a special educational need should necessarily be protected from charges through the Bill. That would go too far.

Our overriding principle is that charging should be based on the ability to pay. However, for the reasons to which I have alluded, I recognise that that needs to be tempered in the case of pupils with special educational needs in a way that ensures that any charges are reasonable, and do not penalise families where their children have to travel some distance to school. That is very much the point that was raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud.

We are holding helpful discussions with a range of organisations that represent different groups of pupils with special educational needs, particularly the Special Educational Consortium. As I am sure hon. Members know, it issued a carefully considered briefing document and press release in advance of our proceedings today. The purpose of those discussions is to identify whether it is possible to have a set of expectations that are acceptable across the spectrum of special educational needs to cater for pupils with such needs and to be affordable for local education authorities.

There is a further problem with amendment No. 46. If we made arrangements that allowed all pupils with special educational needs, whether or not they had a statement, to travel to any suitable school free of charge, we could find ourselves in the unintended position where parents might seek to get their child designated as a pupil with special educational needs simply to gain an entitlement to free transport. That could cause unnecessary bureaucracy and it might lead parents of pupils with minor learning differences to seek such designation.

My undertaking today is to do some further work in that area, because all Committee members would agree that it would be unjust if families of children with mobility difficulties or severe special educational needs had to pay for transport to take them to and from school, whereas their peer group were not charged or were able to walk. I will let the House know on Report how the discussions that we having with the Special Educational Consortium and others are progressing.

There is also an issue about children with special educational needs who are not attending their nearest suitable school, and that is an issue about which concern has been expressed during all parts of the debate. The concern applies under existing legislation and is not a consequence of the Bill. Amendment No.46 describes pupils

''attending a school which is deemed to be suitable by virtue of the provision made for particular needs.''.

That does not specify that the school has to be the closest one that can cater for the pupil with the special need. A parent could choose a school a considerable distance away rather than one with adequate provision that is closer to home. In some cases, a school that is further away may be named on a statement by agreement between parents and LEAs, with the agreement that parents will pay for the additional costs of the transport. That would put those parents in much the same position as any other parent who exercises preference in the education system.

If the Bill overturned existing agreements and principles, which, by and large, work well, and made all transport to special schools free, there could be unacceptable pressure on LEA budgets. That would be to the detriment of many other children whose transport needs have to be met out of a limited budget.

Amendment No. 60 details the general requirement for scheme authorities to provide reports as required. We have taken that approach because the schemes are expected to last for several years and monitoring requirements, as my hon. Friend the Member for Wimbledon reminded us, may need to be modified in the light of experience. We wanted to say clearly in the prospectus that approved schemes will be required to produce an annual report for the DFES or the National Assembly for Wales as appropriate, with statistics on home-to-school travel that analyse the effect that schemes have had in a number of respects, including on the important issue of reducing car use on the school run. A report should contain an account of what has gone well and badly, the views of key partners and financial annexes detailing the economics of the scheme.

Roger Casale (Labour, Wimbledon)

I am grateful for what the Minister has just said, because the monitoring process will be a key lever in rooting out the kind of problems that we have identified. We know that the problems are there and we need to be able to do something about them. The monitoring and annual reporting that the Minister has announced will go a great way towards dealing with those problems.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

I thank my hon. Friend for that. We also say in the prospectus that we expect that pilot authorities will put in place reliable systems for monitoring travel-to-school patterns, so we can make a thorough assessment of the overall impact of the travel scheme. The crucial point that is relevant to this group of amendments is that that assessment will enable us to look at the impact on pupils by category. That means that we can consider the difference that the scheme is making, particularly to some of the more vulnerable groups that we are addressing in this discussion of special educational needs and disability, and to those with which we will deal when we discuss low-income families and the protected category.

We have also said that the DFES will commission an independent evaluation of English schemes that will draw together an analysis of each one, and provide evidence for the decision about whether to roll out the school travel scheme approach. Pilot authorities will be under an obligation to co-operate fully with that independent evaluation, so that it provides the greatest benefits possible to all local authorities. I hope that that approach demonstrates our desire to collect a wide range of information to evaluate the impact of the schemes, including the impact on those with special educational needs and/or disabilities, because that is important.

I hope that hon. Members from all parties agree that we can subscribe to moving forward on the basis of the consultation and discussion, which I have described, with those who represent the interests of those with special educational needs. As I have said, the purpose of those further discussions will be to find a flexible system for families of pupils with special educational needs that does not impose free transport with possible unintended consequences and brings benefits where they are appropriate.

Transport for pupils with special educational needs does not necessarily have to be provided free of charge. As I said, that is under discussion with one of the interested parties. We need fair arrangements that do not leave families with a child with special educational needs disadvantaged in comparison with other families with children attending mainstream schools. That is the nub of the issue in this debate and I hope that given what I have said, hon. Members will accept my assurances and not press the amendments.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I, too, welcome you to the Chair, Mr. O'Brien. As you will see, consensus seems to be breaking out throughout the proceedings. I am sure that it will end at some point during the next three sittings, and we await that with trepidation.

I think that all hon. Members listening to the Minister's reply would welcome his reassurances. In moving amendment No. 53 I referred to the somewhat bland and anodyne response that the Government gave to the Education and Skills Committee's report. The Minister has moved on from that. We await with interest his consultation with the Special Educational Consortium and hope that he comes up with a workable solution.

In his comments on amendment No. 53, the Minister referred to guidance that is in place. However, given the concern expressed by the hon. Member for Wimbledon, other hon. Members and the Special Educational Consortium, it seems that it is not working. The guidance needs to be tough, and the Bill provides the opportunity to consider it and make it more robust. The Minister has referred on several occasions to a revised prospectus. It would be helpful if he said whether that will be available before Report, so that we can see to what extent the reassurances that he has given on a number of issues have been reflected.

I welcome the Minister's commitment to considering a revised definition of mobility. That is important and would cover, as he indicated, not only those with physical disabilities but those with a condition that affects their ability, such as autism, which I referred to earlier. The Minister also touched on the ability to pay and on the basis of charging. We will come to those matters later, but I ask him to recognise—I am sure that he does—that many parents of children with special educational needs have other financial pressures. Some grants for equipment are means-tested; parents who do not meet that means test have to find significant sums from their own capital or income to buy specialist equipment. They also find that the respite care allocated from social services is insufficient for their needs and have to pay for top-ups. There are some complex arguments about affordability that need to be considered in the prospectus.

On amendment No. 46, I recognise the Minister's point about parents who have a school named in their statement but are required to pay for transport to it. Such a situation has arisen in my own constituency, in which a parent fought—rightly, in my view—for a particular school to be named; because that was further away than the nearest suitable scheme, the parent paid for the transport. It is good if one is in a position to afford that, but not every parent is, and I am concerned about how local authorities might interpret the word ''suitable'' in such situations.

Earlier, I gave the example of a school in Surrey with a language specialist unit that I visited yesterday. In Surrey, there are more statemented children with language difficulties who would like to go to such specialist units than can be fitted in. As an alternative, they might be told to go to the nearest school and have the support of a classroom assistant or learning support assistant. That would be suitable according to the Minister's arguments, but it might not be the best school for that child. We need to bear in mind that conflict with regard to suitability.

I should like to conclude on two points. First, the 65 per cent. figure cited by my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale came from an impeccable source: the Department itself.

Vernon Coaker (Labour, Gedling)

Which part of the Department?

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I am sure that the Secretary of State takes responsibility for all parts of the Department. I gather that the reference is on page 33 of the DFES's ''Travelling to School: a good practice guide.'' I am sure that that figure must be true.

The Select Committee report gave a word of warning. I refer to paragraph 77:

''Schemes will have to offer a complex range of transport facilities to suit the broad spectrum of need covered by the term 'SEN' and costs will necessarily increase as services get better at providing for pupils with the highest level of need. We agree with Mr Congdon in his assessment that the Bill does not primarily concern itself with the details of SEN transport and thus treats it in a manner that could produce unintended and detrimental consequences''.

Mr. Congdon's words act as a reminder to us all of the complexity of special educational needs transport and how we should proceed carefully. Perhaps they are words of advice to potential scheme authorities, although I presume that there is no need for them to include provision for special educational needs in their pilot schemes, and many might find it advisable to steer well clear.

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I beg to move amendment No. 32, in page 2, line 29, leave out

'has the meaning given by section 444(5)'

and insert 'means 1 mile.'.

This is a probing amendment. It is intended to air the issue of statutory walking distance. The current position is that free transport is provided for primary schoolchildren who have to walk more than 2 miles to school and secondary schoolchildren who have to walk more than 3 miles.

I am sure that we will touch on the issues that face rural areas later in the Committee's proceedings. However, as was mentioned on Second Reading, in many urban areas congestion problems arise not from children travelling more than 2 or 3 miles to their primary or secondary school, but from children being taken by car to school where the distance from home is less than 2 or 3 miles.

I represent a suburban constituency where few children are entitled to free school transport by virtue of their journey from home to school. It is notable that traffic congestion in my constituency is far less during school holidays than it is during term time. By sticking to the 2 and 3-mile limits, to what extent are we requiring scheme authorities to grasp the nettle of congestion in urban areas where journeys are short?

The Audit Commission study on school transport found that over 60 per cent. of primary schoolchildren who live between 1 and 2 miles from their school travel by car, and that about 30 per cent. of secondary school pupils who live between 2 and 3 miles from school travel by car. If we were to force LEAs to provide free transport for pupils who live more than a mile from school, that might make them look more carefully at congestion in urban areas. Coupled with the ability to charge—which we will debate later—it would give

them some means of financing schemes that meet the needs of pupils who live closer to their schools and of reducing the burden on our roads, which is particularly great at home time and when children go to school in the morning.

As the Bill is currently drafted, local authorities might not choose to address congestion in urban areas. The amendment is intended to probe the Government and to press them to encourage LEAs to tackle that problem.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

I welcome the opportunity to explore this issue. The hon. Member for Fareham once again demonstrates a point that has come up at other stages both today and on Second Reading. The enabling character of the Bill is such that it has different relevance to different communities. My constituency is similar to the hon. Gentleman's in that I doubt that there are many children in it who are covered by the provisions of the current legislation in respect of statutory walking distances. However, there are different needs in different parts of the country.

The current system is that LEAs must ensure that free transport is provided where pupils of compulsory school age live beyond the statutory walking distances of 2 miles for those under 8 and 3 miles for older children. The first thing to do is to accept fully the hon. Gentleman's point that those distances, which relate to legislation that dates back 60 years, do not reflect the distances that many children and their parents are willing to walk in the modern age, for all sorts of usually understandable reasons.

The hon. Gentleman quoted some research; the national travel survey shows that 83 per cent. of pupils will walk a mile or less to school, but only 45 per cent. will walk between 1 and 2 miles, and just 16 per cent. will walk between 2 and 3 miles. Many children living between 1 and 3 miles from school travel in all sorts of other ways, including by car, taxi or bus. Many of those options can be hugely expensive for the families.

I accept that this is a probing amendment, but I just put on record that, were the amendment to be passed, there would be a substantial cost to local authorities. However, this probing amendment is useful, because it reminds us that we need to meet the needs of all pupils. We have rightly been reminded, generally by those critical of the Bill, of the needs of those who travel a very long way, usually in rural areas, to their nearest suitable school and some of the issues that that brings up. The hon. Member for Hexham (Mr. Atkinson) mentioned that this morning, and a number of hon. Members from all parties did so on Second Reading.

However, there is also a set of issues about the needs of pupils who live between 1 and 3 miles away from school, and I welcome the opportunity for that to be explored. On Second Reading, I recall that my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford (Mr. Kidney) made an interesting contribution about his constituency and those who fall just outside the 3-mile parameter. The advantage of the flexibility of the Bill is that it will enable consideration to be given to children in that

1 to 3-mile category, and it will potentially give them access to subsidised or concessionary transport schemes that might not be available to them at the moment.

We know that there are many children, particularly at secondary schools, who walk or cycle more than a mile, and in some cases substantially more. That reminds us that a lot depends on the school, the local authority, and the willingness to countenance the issues. An example that has been quoted elsewhere is that of Kesgrave high school near Ipswich in Suffolk, where 60 per cent. of pupils regularly cycle several miles to school along a sophisticated network of cycle paths. The Department for Transport has just announced a £10 million extension of the national cycle network to schools, which would improve the cycling infrastructure and make it possible for more children to cycle safely to school.

We did not believe that anyone had put forward a suitable and workable alternative to the 2 and 3-mile provisions of 1944. In putting forward his proposal, the hon. Member for Fareham gives me the opportunity to reinforce that point and to say that a potential benefit of the Bill is that we can enable access to forms of transport that might not currently be available, in particular for those children who live just within those statutory walking distances. I welcome the opportunity to say that. In light of that, I ask the hon. Gentleman to withdraw his amendment.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

As the Minister said, this is very much a probing amendment. If we are to achieve the objectives of the Bill relating to reducing congestion in urban areas, we need to encourage local authorities to consider the issues, particularly in the context of encouraging or facilitating the provision of transport to children living less than 3 miles away from their secondary school. The purpose of the amendment was to raise that point, and I am concerned that, at the moment, local authorities might choose not to go down that route. Given the amount of traffic congestion in urban areas—a grave amount in some parts of the country—and given continuing house-building and development, and the pressures that that puts on the infrastructure, we need to tackle the issue of excessive use of car journeys to school if we are to relieve some of the pressure on the infrastructure. Having said that, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I beg to move amendment No. 54, in page 2, line 30, at end insert—

'(3A) The scheme shall have regard to the need to be consistent with the scheme authority's transport policy statement prepared under section 509AA of the Education Act 1996.'.

This amendment was suggested by the Special Educational Consortium. It is intended to tease out the interaction between the Bill and the provision of post-16 transport, and particularly to find out how the Bill will affect children with special educational needs. The Government are committed to expanding the section of the prospectus dealing with post-16 transport, as is shown by their response to the Select Committee

report. The prospectus states that pilots might also trial closer links with post-16 transport policies, leading to a more consistent provision for older pupils.

The Royal National Institute of the Blind welcomed the opportunity to take part in the Department for Education and Skills working group on the provision of education transport for 16 to 19-year-olds. Guidance for the transport support arrangements for that age group states:

''Good practice suggests that wherever possible, LEAs and their partners should provide transport support until at least the age of 21, and ideally up to the age of 25.''

Despite the guidance, there is concern that many disabled students over the age of 19 find it difficult to get support for their transport costs from the LEA, even though they are funded to continue in education by the Learning and Skills Council. An issue raised with me when visiting special schools and talking to special educational needs groups is that the post-16 provision for many of those young people needs additional support. Because of the nature of some of their disabilities, many young people with special educational needs have to stay in further education beyond the normal cut-off age of 18 or 19.

The RNIB has collected information concerning existing support. The Black Country Connexions partnership reports that three out of four LEAs in its area will not fund the transport costs of disabled students beyond the age of 19. If we are to continue to help young people with special educational needs access further education, we must ensure that there is continuing transport provision for them, and that may require financial support. This is a probing amendment, and I would welcome the Minister's comments.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman and to the RNIB, which, as he rightly said, is engaged in this important discussion with us. As he explained, local education authorities are required to follow clear criteria about the transport support they offer to sixth-form-age students—16 to 19-year-olds. We are well aware of the challenge that he set out concerning the barriers to participation that transport costs constitute for many 16 to 19-year-olds, and how they particularly affect those with disabilities and special educational needs.

We made it clear in publishing the Bill and the prospectus that their primary purpose is to reduce car trips on the journey to and from school. However, beyond that, we want pilots to focus on different forms of provision suited to their local priorities. Under the heading of scheme objectives, the prospectus that sits alongside the Bill sets out a non-exhaustive list of areas that might be considered, one of which is closer links with post-16 transport policies leading to more consistent provision for older pupils.

I hope that hon. Members will agree that in the context of the Bill, scheme authorities are best placed to decide what schemes they want to develop, and where extended and improved provision should be targeted to meet local priorities best. Providing guidelines that include closer post-16 links and

establishing a more seamless provision of transport across the age groups in the prospectus already addresses the issues raised by the amendment.

I encourage authorities to come forward with proposals that make that link. The hon. Gentleman has certainly assisted that process by tabling the amendment, but it is not the best vehicle for encouraging such action. I therefore ask him to withdraw it.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I am grateful to the Minister for his reassurance. Will he consider a broader issue? Post-16 education is funded by the Learning and Skills Council, but transport is funded by LEAs. If there were a change in responsibilities, aligning both transport and funding for education, would it make the problem far easier to tackle than is currently the case? Having said that, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

I beg to move amendment No. 9, in page 2, line 31, leave out from beginning to end of line 11 on page 3.

Bill O'Brien (Labour, Normanton)

With this it will be convenient to discuss the following: Amendment No. 49, in page 2, line 33, at end insert

'and this shall include—

(a) the basis on which the charge will be calculated,

(b) the arrangements for increasing the charges,

(c) the availability of concessionary fares, and

(d) the method of collection.'.

Amendment No. 33, in page 2, line 33, at end insert—

'(1A) Income from the charges shall be applied only to furthering the objectives of the scheme.'.

New clause 2—Local authority revenue—

'(1) No account shall be taken of the revenues derived from any scheme made pursuant to this Act in determining the funding of schools and local education authorities.

(2) In determining the proportion of a local education authority's budget to be transferred to any school, no account shall be taken of any expenditure on school transport incurred by that school.'.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

I am sorry to say that consensus breaks down at this point. I began my speech this morning by quoting Mr. Sykes' evidence to the Education Committee. He said that the sole and principal purpose of the Bill is to row back from previous commitments to school transport that Governments have given under previous legislation. I concur with that hypothesis and intend to present an irrefutable argument about why that is a bad thing to do.

It is a traditional, well-established view that it should not be less costly for one child to go to school than another child. That is the philosophy behind the current legislation. When costs were involved because walking was not an option, the assumption was that the local authority paid. Thus, there was no identifiable inequity in access at that point. When that legislation was drafted, the majority of children walked or cycled to school and occasionally went by

public transport, which, in those days, was remarkably economical. Much research shows that, when children arrive at school, having walked and cycled, they are in a far more biddable and ready state for education than when they had travelled by other means. Members of the Committee will certainly recall from their school days that that was often the usual way in which they travelled to school. I attended five different schools and I do not recall getting any form of motorised transport, apart from the odd trolley bus and that does not really count. Such travel arrangements did not have much effect on my behaviour, but I reflect on how much worse it could have been had I not travelled in such a way.

Nevertheless, the counter arguments that were presented on Second Reading seemed to impress certain Labour Back Benchers. Two points were made in particular. It was said that children from poor families might incur some cost, even though they lived within the 3 or 2-mile limit and that there was some social inequity in that. It was also said that children from rich families who lived outside the 3 or 2-mile limit could in many cases well afford to pay for the travel. That appealed to the social conscience of many Labour Members and persuaded them that there was some merit in rowing back from such an entitlement.

The background to the argument was to say that we are living in a changed world, not in a world in which it is always safe for children to walk or cycle to school, even when they can. In fact, children generally seem more reluctant to walk or cycle to school than they were in the past. The roads are congested and dangerous, and the cost of public transport—often the favoured option—is becoming increasingly expensive since it has been deregulated. If we take that new problem as the real excuse for the Bill, there are obviously other remedies, one of which would be to work hard on making roads to school safe. Many local authorities are currently doing that, not always with tremendous effect.

One local authority mysteriously planted throughout the borough little yellow arrows pointing in the direction of the school. That was supposed to lead to a massive transfer of children from the car to the pavement. Most children were mystified by the arrows and, over time, I am sorry to say that they were eroded or rubbed out—hopefully, by the march of children on their way to school, but I am not entirely convinced that that was the case. It could have been caused by dog owners walking their dogs late at night, for all I know. The priority is safer routes to schools, whether or not children need help with the travel. There are children who are near to a school and have quite a dangerous road to cross. They need a safe route to school, irrespective of whether any travel scheme would incorporate them within it. The point about working on safer routes to schools applies whether or not children need subsidising. I do not think that one can argue that children who are approximate or very near to a school and who will not qualify for travel

schemes, or children who are affluent but who are within the 2-mile or 3-mile limit are any the less vulnerable or at risk when routes to school are unsafe.

There is an overall priority to make routes safe. If the thrust of any travel schemes is to ignore that or to concentrate on not doing that, its effects will not be wholly beneficial. I will turn to the other side of the coin: richer families can afford to pay.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

Before the hon. Gentleman moves on to another part of the debate, I want to ask him about a case in my constituency that I discussed on Second Reading. The village of Worth Matravers is 2.9 miles away from Swanage middle school, down a very narrow country lane that is not well lit. How do we make that route safer, apart from by giving people a safe form of motorised transport to school?

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

There is nothing in legislation to stop a local authority putting a safe scheme in—a bus or whatever. That is not a good case for reneging on the existing entitlement of children who lie beyond the 2.9-mile limit. In the debate, we were always going to discuss the one child who is right on the cusp, as it were. When we come to Members' London allowances and things like that, we get exactly the same sort of issue. There will always be those issues at the margins. We should accept them and take them as not substantially moving on the debate.

The view could be taken that some families, through no particular merit, have ample resources and benefit from a scheme whereas other, more deserving, people who live within the 3-mile limit do not. If one examines the effects of that, those are precisely the families who will have one, two, or, in some cases, three cars. Where their children do not get free transport to school they will undoubtedly employ a car and an extra trip will be made. The larger the family, the more incentive there is to do that. Larger families on moderate incomes, with whom I have much sympathy, will be adversely affected by rowing back on this entitlement.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

The hon. Gentleman talked about the issue of larger families. A specific amendment tackles that later on. They are the sorts of people who might end up buying a second car to take their children to school. The cost-benefit analysis might indicate that paying for many children on a bus is greater than the cost of buying a car, if one considers the lifecycle of a car. Therefore, more people will be forced on to the road because of charging, as opposed to people being taken off the road and traffic congestion being reduced, which the measure seeks to achieve.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

I should declare an interest, because although my children are all quite large now, at one stage I had four children under five, and I can empathise with the large family's predicament. I know of large families in my constituency for whom it is simpler and more economical to put the children in the car and take them to the school gate, even if there is a bus stop right outside.

At the end of the day, we must say to ourselves, ''What does this legislation achieve?'' We can all make a case for school buses, for transport subsidies, for encouraging cycling and so on. However, every case that we can make falls within the existing powers of local authorities—except the ability to renege on the entitlement of families who live beyond the current statutory limits. Existing pilots can, in every respect, accomplish what the Bill seeks to produce—other than varying the charging regime. Even if existing local authority powers do not seem to have accomplished the task, all local authorities already have the power to innovate.

I challenge the Minister to tell us what can be done by the Bill that cannot currently be done by local authorities under the power to innovate given to them by the Government. The Bill is a rather fancy wrapping to remove what I think the Secretary of State called a legislative straitjacket or stranglehold—but I correctly described that as reneging on an existing entitlement.

During the debate the right hon. Member for North-West Hampshire (Sir George Young) made an eloquent speech saying that he could not think of an a priori argument that would force him to die in a ditch over existing entitlement. That was a sound honest point. However, I am not just presenting an a priori argument, I am talking about a complete lack of rationale for the measure. We do not want to enact anything that reverses an entitlement if it seems to do so little else.

I shall speak briefly to new clause 2, which deals with a theme developed by the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale when he challenged the Secretary of State to say that whatever money was raised via school transport schemes would not be used in some other way by the local authority—would not be parked, earmarked, set aside or ring-fenced—and would not affect how local authorities are funded by the Government.

It is possible for local authorities to ring-fence their transport account if they wish, and it is also possible for local authorities to be mandated to do so. However, it has never been possible to see that the Government are giving an honest deal when the rate support grant is announced. None the less, I expect Governments to make allowance for the revenue that some local authorities expect to receive when the schemes are up and running. That will happen, but we will not be able to detect it. Although the Government have made promises, it will be difficult to see whether they have delivered on them.

Finally, I turn to a critique of amendment No. 9, which I did not frame myself. It belongs to the ''razed earth'' school of amendments, because it would remove large chunks and swathes of the Bill, and it has certain inelegant features that I had not detected until I reread it. It would seem to exclude voluntary schemes that do not even imply reneging on existing entitlements. It might, therefore, be more appropriate if I held back some of my fire and waited until Report. However, this is a fundamental point of principle between the parties; it is about whether it is genuinely

worthwhile removing, for a spurious set of reasons, an entitlement that has existed for some time and done a lot of good.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I join the consensus on this side of the Room in objecting to the principle of charging. I am sure that it does not require an Act of Parliament to enable people to make voluntary contributions towards school transport. The hon. Member for Southport should not have many regrets over the scorched-earth style of drafting that he adopted.

This is one of the key issues behind the Bill. For 60 years, free school transport for families has been enshrined in legislation as a right, and the Bill would remove it. We need to be wary of the fact that the Bill will enable local authorities to charge for transport that has hitherto been free. We will return to this topic later, because of the way in which the Bill is drafted. The provision may, perhaps, be a once and for all change in the entitlement of families to free school transport for their children.

It is regrettable that a Labour Government are seeking to impose what I consider to be a tax on families who wish to send their children to school. It is a tax that they cannot avoid, so in that regard it is a good tax; there will not be a problem with people trying to avoid it. However, I am sure there will be a problem with collection; we will address that later. The introduction of charging will mean that people who are above the cut-off level for free school transport will suffer, and families in urban areas will be penalised because of where they live.

Members of all parties who represent rural constituencies should recognise the cost that the Bill is likely to impose on their constituents. We must think very carefully about introducing charging. It would have a significant effect on some families.

David Kidney (Labour, Stafford)

A few minutes ago, the hon. Gentleman reminded us of the desirability of getting off the road cars making journeys of between 1 and 3 miles to school, and he urged the Minister to make journeys of over a mile free to pupils. If he is against charging, is he proposing that that should be funded by a new charge on the taxpayer?

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

The hon. Gentleman has considerable experience of serving on Committees, so I am surprised that he does not recognise opportunities to table probing amendments, stimulate debates and open up discussion about what legislation entails. That is all I have been trying to do.

The amendment is important in that it would remove the right of schemes to charge for school transport, and I support it. We need to think about the objectives of the Bill and whether charging will lead to their being achieved. I fear that charging will add to road congestion because many families will take their children to school by car. In evidence to the Select Committee, reference was made to an LEA that charges £500 for children to attend a denominational school. We need only think about three or four

children being charged that for the economics that I outlined in my intervention on the hon. Member for Southport to add up. In that situation, the costs of car ownership are far outweighed by the costs of sending children to school by bus.

Local authorities that put forward schemes need to think about whether charging will add to the problem. If charging reaches a high enough level, it could make the problems on our roads worse, and the Bill would be counter-productive because all it would do is to add to the problems. That is why charging might present difficulties when these measures are implemented.

It is also wrong in principle for charges to be levied on children's journeys to school. As my hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale said, this is a third-term tax rise; its purpose is to fund the growing black hole in the Government's finances.

Other amendments in the group are designed to tease out some of the key issues, and I shall now turn to them, and to the new clause.

Jim Knight rose—

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

If the hon. Gentleman is going to speak in support of the amendment I will be delighted, but I fear that his loyalty to the party cause will preclude him from doing so. Therefore, I will delay the excitement of listening to his remarks.

Amendment No. 49 is intended to tease out of the Government some of the practical implications of charging for school transport. The prospectus must give guidance to potential scheme authorities as to how the charging mechanism will work. Our suggested paragraph (a) means that we need to understand what the basis of the charge might be. One could go for a flat-rate charge, so that everyone using the bus paid the same amount. That would be easy to administer, and there are some attractions to that, but of course a flat-rate charge would mean that people living close at hand would probably end up subsidising those who lived far away, who would pay the same rate. There would be no correlation between the charge and the extent to which someone used the bus. The Government might find that attractive; they could charge just one rate, as buses in London charge a £1 fare regardless of the length of the journey.

If there were a distance-related charge, people living close at hand would not subsidise those who lived further away. Would the higher charge for those who lived in more outlying, perhaps rural, areas dissuade such people from using a bus, because the fare would be too high? Most bus fares are distance-related, but there is a trade-off between flat-rate and distance-related charges, and the Government and scheme authorities need to think about that in relation to any guidance given on the matter.

Suggested paragraph (b) is about the basis of any future increases. It is all very well having a scheme that, on day one, sets out a charge that those consulted about the scheme think is fair and reasonable, but what happens in subsequent years? What if there is poor settlement for schools, not dissimilar to that

experienced by many schools in 2003-04, and LEAs decide to increase the charges above the rate of inflation, in order to try to recover a shortfall in grant from Government? Some clarity on the basis of increases in charges would be good.

What happens about concessionary fares? We talked about issues connected with amendment No. 60, which in a sense identified a potential concessionary fare, whereby people would not pay the full cost of school transport if their child had special educational needs; they would simply pay the excess, and the normal charge would be paid for by the LEA. That would be a concessionary fare, and we need to have the basis of concessionary fares in the scheme application. How will we tackle such issues? Many groups out there are concerned about the impact on charging in terms of inclusion—and I mean social inclusion, rather than inclusion from a special educational needs perspective. We need to make sure that concessionary fares are discussed in the scheme consultation.

We also need to think about who will collect the fare revenue. Will there be conductors on every bus, collecting the flat-rate or distance-related charge? Will we expect the head teacher to collect the money from pupils at school, and so add to the burdens that head teachers already face? Will we expect the LEA to require parents to set up a standing order, to enable the LEA to collect the fare revenue in the most efficient way from people who use the school transport?

Will we expect parents to pay daily, weekly, monthly or termly? Clearly, collecting one amount per term would make life easy for local education authorities, and would cut down on transaction costs, but what happens if a family cannot afford to pay in one fell swoop for that term's transport? Certainly, if one charges £500 a term for school transport, a number of families would find that difficult to pay. I would therefore look to spread the cost of payments across a term.

Revenue collection sounds a dull topic in many respects, but how schools operate and how we collect the revenue will affect households' finances. The purpose of the amendment is really to tease out some of those details, and perhaps to get the Department to think in its consultations about the next draft of the prospectus and consider the issues with local education authorities. That way, before the schemes are unleashed on an unsuspecting public, there could be some guidance to help those consulted to determine whether they think that the scheme should apply in their area.

Next I shall talk about amendment No. 33 and new clause 2. The concerns raised on Second Reading were about what will happen to revenue raised by the scheme. One element of that concern was to ensure that, where possible, income generated was ring-fenced and kept solely for the purposes of the Bill; we will come later to amendment No. 50, which covers in detail possible uses for the revenue. We must ring-fence the revenue to ensure that it is used to tackle the problems identified so far in Committee and on Second Reading, rather than to subsidise other aspects

of LEAs' activities. There is a risk that some of the money could be used in that way, and we do not want to give LEAs an incentive to raise the charges to cover funding shortfalls.

On new clause 2, we are concerned about how the Treasury will react to the money raised. I am sure that the Secretary of State was right to assure us that none of the money will be taken into account by the Treasury, but history has shown that where extra revenue sources are found, the amount of support that bodies get is diminished.

Let me give an example relevant to the Department of Education and Skills regarding the introduction of tuition fees—the £1,100 up-front fee. According to the Department's annual report, higher education funding per pupil for 2001-02 was £5,020. The following year, the fees were introduced and an extra £1,100 was paid by each student. Therefore, one would expect funding to have gone up to £6,120, but no, it did not. The additional resources raised by tuition fees did not flow through to the universities. The Government have form on this matter. [Interruption.] Labour Members express surprise, but if they look at the Department's annual report they will see that the introduction of up-front tuition fees did not result in an increase of funding to universities. The per capita funding per head demonstrates that.

I am concerned that the Treasury will find a way to claw back the additional revenue that LEAs will raise through the charging, and that resources available to LEAs will not rise, but will remain unchanged. I perceive scepticism from Labour Members, but we have seen that reality in the context of other measures introduced by the Department of Education and Skills to help other sectors. We want to prevent LEAs from suffering a clawback of the money raised.

There is also a concern that there is pressure on LEAs to cut back the school transport budget when the amount or proportion of LEA money to be passported down to schools increases. With less money available to LEAs from the centre, there is a concern that if we increase the proportion to be passported, school transport budgets will be under pressure. We want to exclude school transport budgets from that process, and from the calculation of the proportion of money to be passported.

Amendment No. 33 and new clause 2 are designed to protect the money raised, so that parents forced to pay the charges know that the money will not be clawed back by the Treasury but will be applied to the scheme objectives. If parents are to be charged for school transport, they should receive assurance from the Government that the money will not be diverted.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

I do not want to take up much of the Committee's time, but I want to ensure that voices other than the Minister's speak in favour of the principle of charging. I notice that the hon. Member for Fareham said that he opposed charging in principle. I find that odd, given that his party now supports the congestion charge for London, and that what we are discussing is a charge to deal with

congestion. Many of us have been won over by the operation of the scheme in London, and think that there are circumstances in which charging to deal with congestion is appropriate. By offering charging in the context of pilots, we would maximise the flexibility that local education authorities could employ when devising new ways to deal with congestion and other transport problems that, as all Committee members acknowledge, exist for people getting to and from school.

I go back to the example of Worth Matravers, which I raised in my intervention on the hon. Member for Southport. For example, the area covered by Swanage middle school in my constituency includes some villages that are 2.9 miles away, and some that are further away. If we had a flat-rate universal scheme with an affordable fare of perhaps £1 a day, that might create opportunities for a much better service for all pupils at such schools, although I do not say that it necessarily would. Such pupils would include the majority who lived within the 3-mile radius, many of whom have no option of public transport, or a safe lane to cycle or walk down. Such a scheme might create a better, safer environment for them to get to and from school by walking, cycling or some form of bus. I accept that schemes that charge in very rural areas such as that represented by the hon. Member for Hexham might not be appropriate. Certainly, means-testing would be appropriate, as proposed in the Bill.

I support amendment No. 27, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Stafford, which would extend means-testing beyond those entitled to free school meals. I stress that my support is for the creation of pilots.

David Drew (Labour/Co-operative, Stroud)

Will my hon. Friend give way?

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

Of course, as my hon. Friend asked so forcefully.

David Drew (Labour/Co-operative, Stroud)

Does my hon. Friend accept that one of the biggest problems is the charging for post-16 students? One of the dilemmas is that there are poor post-16 students. I welcome the Government's education maintenance allowances, but such students might still pay a charge for using the school coach, while relatively better-off but younger pupils went free. There are some anomalies in the system.

Jim Knight (Labour, South Dorset)

Absolutely. There are problems and anomalies in operating transport to and from our schools. We have discussed the work done by Tomlinson on the 14-to-19 age group. Schools and further education colleges will merge more and more; they are starting to do so in my constituency. We need the pilots and we need to maximise their flexibility. I support, as the Bill does, keeping open the option of charging in those limited pilot areas.

Huw Edwards (Labour, Monmouth)

As I represent a very rural area, my instincts are more with the Opposition parties on this issue. The fundamental problem in the towns that I represent—Monmouth, Abergavenny, Chepstow—is not congestion, but that most pupils live a long way from school. Roughly

40 per cent., possibly 45 per cent., of pupils at Monmouth comprehensive school go there by one form of transport or another. The great majority of those who use school transport use contract buses, although they might use other buses that serve the area. Such buses are an absolute lifeline.

I accept that the provisions are only for pilot areas, but I would like my hon. Friend the Minister to reiterate that, because there will be a certain amount of political distortion about the intentions of the Bill. I do not suggest for a moment that Opposition parties have distorted anything, but there will be such distortion at a local level and I hope that the Minister will give the assurance that there is nothing compulsory about the charging. I happen to believe in devolution, and I do not believe that the Welsh Assembly would wish to introduce charging in a rural area such as mine. However, I have referred to an important principle; I ask the Minister to establish that there is nothing compulsory about the charging introduced by the Bill. I have some anxiety that such charging may establish a precedent. Will my hon. Friend accept that there are fundamentally different problems between mainly urban areas where the great bulk of pupils do not require school transport and those in rural areas, such as mine, where a high proportion of pupils do require transport to get to school?

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

We have moved to an important part of the Bill. I shall deal with amendments Nos. 9, 49 and 33 and new clause 2 in turn, but first I wish to respond to a point that I overlooked in an earlier debate. The hon. Member for Fareham asked whether the revised prospectus would be available for us to debate on Report. I am happy to give him and the Committee the undertaking that it will be. Clearly, several matters that have been raised, including those raised in this debate, are relevant to the revision of the prospectus.

The hon. Gentleman referred also to previous commitments that were given about tuition fees. I am reliably informed by those who know more about such matters than I do that the plans that we inherited when we came to power in 1997 would have resulted in a significant cut in higher education funding. The up-front fees ensured that that cut in funding could be reversed, so the commitment given in Committee and on the Floor of the House that it was new money for the universities was kept to. Had that commitment not been made and new money not been raised, universities would have experienced a substantial cut on top of the 30 per cent. cut in student funding that they had already experienced during the previous Government. That is probably the most partisan that I have been during today's proceedings. We might return to our earlier consensual approach, but perhaps not in the current debate.

Amendment No. 9 is central to the Bill and to its ability to make an impact. It would have several effects. It would remove the possibility for LEAs to charge. It would remove from local authorities the capacity to then redistribute the subsidy for home-to-school transport according to their local priorities. It

would also remove from the Bill the concept of the protected child, which I am sure was an unintended consequence.

As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said on Second Reading, under the current system, only a small minority of pupils benefit from free or assisted home- to-school transport. A survey conducted jointly by ourselves, the Confederation of Education Service Managers and the National Audit Office in the summer of 2003 suggests that the number of beneficiaries of the current system is about 700,000 in England, or about 10 per cent. In Wales, it is somewhat higher. We estimate that it is about 20 per cent.

Huw Edwards (Labour, Monmouth)

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for giving us details of the research that has been undertaken, but just as we distinguish between post offices that serve urban and rural areas, perhaps we could distinguish between schools that serve urban and rural areas. I wonder if the figures would be different if he considered the number of children who rely on free school transport in urban areas.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

That is precisely why I am happy to give my hon. Friend the assurance that he sought earlier. The relevance of such an approach will differ between different communities. Indeed, it will differ within single local education authorities for the reasons that we explored in our discussions this morning. What might be relevant to a constituency like his might not be relevant to my constituency, or such matters might be neither relevant to an urban or suburban constituency nor to a hugely rural constituency. I want to explore that argument now. The purpose of the Bill is to enable local authorities that wish to do so to pilot different approaches according to local needs and circumstances. If we have figures according to the levels of rurality, I shall ensure that they are placed in the Library. I shall also write to my hon. Friend outlining them. The figures for Wales might be separate from those for England.

The national travel survey records a fairly constant figure of 20 per cent. of pupils taking the bus to school in England and a higher figure of 30 per cent. in Wales. That suggests that as many families pay for school transport as receive free or assisted transport from or through the local education authority.

Recent research conducted by my Department suggests that, because of their circumstances, parents on lower incomes are more likely to have to pay for their child's travel to school than those on higher incomes. The same research, which I referred to earlier, shows that two thirds of children who take the bus to school have to pay more than £7 each per week to get to school. That is in the region of £300 per year per child, which demonstrates that a significant number of children today pay significant sums of money to get to and from school.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

I am interested in the statistics. Do they take account of the amount that different socio-economic groups pay on public transport, or do they take account of the amount paid by those who provide their own private transport? By themselves, the figures could indicate either.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

The figures to which I referred relate to public transport. The hon. Gentleman makes a reasonable point about the use of other modes of transport; but it does not undermine the statistics, which show that a significant number of families already pay quite a lot of money for their children to get to school; and that the number of people from the poorest families using that mode of transport is greater than the number from the better-off families.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

Does the Minister accept that families are just as poor if they pay at the petrol pump as if they had paid at the bus stop?

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

Yes, but I am not sure what point the hon. Gentleman is trying to make. The reality is that those who take the bus are paying the fares; and the number from the poorest families are greater, partly because the numbers benefiting from the current set-up, with the statutory walking distances, are disproportionately from better-off families. Perhaps I was not explicit about that part of the equation.

A substantial subsidy is currently provided for home-to-school transport. We reckon that, in 2002-03, it was about £675 million in England and £70 million in Wales. As we know, that money is paid according to distance criteria rather than ability to pay. We will obviously deal in detail with the ability to pay on later amendments. In short, the central thrust of the Bill is that the current system fails adequately to address issues of equity and fairness. A number of my hon. Friends have said so today and on Second Reading.

I want to make it crystal clear that the Bill would allow local education authorities that wish to do so to charge—the devolution point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Monmouth (Mr. Edwards). It will not enable them to do as they please; it will enable them to make small charges for school travel if they feel it is required. There is no compulsion in the Bill; neither is compulsion implied by it. Furthermore, plans to charge parents would need to be made strictly on the ability to pay, with the expectation that it would be at a level that did not lead to a shift from bus to car. I reiterate the comments made on Second Reading by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Education and Skills that bus fares will remain heavily subsidised.

The hon. Member for Christchurch (Mr. Chope) spoke on Second Reading about the cost of providing school transport in Dorset. There is no suggestion that a child would be charged the actual full cost, which he said was £570 a year. That is not what we suggest. A substantial subsidy will still be paid, but it will be distributed differently.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I return to something the Minister said before he started talking about recovering the full cost of transport. Does he believe it to be feasible for a scheme authority to deliver the improvements that he would like to see in school transport simply by using pump-priming money, without an additional increase in resources that might come from charging?

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

I think that that is highly unlikely because the pump-priming money is a small sum that is designed to assist with the set-up costs. The difference that it could make in the provision of service improvements is quite limited. Clearly, if a local authority comes forward under the Bill with a scheme that seeks to do that, we will take that into consideration. The sum that we are talking about in pump-priming is too small for that.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I am grateful to the Minister for that clarification and I will go a step further. Is it his expectation that for schemes to obtain ministerial approval and to meet some of the objectives set out in the prospectus, there will have to be an increase in resources to support the school travel scheme and that that increase will either come from the money raised from the council tax payer or through charging for home-to-school transport?

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

A substantial amount of money is being spent right now and we want to see whether it can be spent more effectively.

Clearly, as the hon. Gentleman and the hon. Member for Southport said, there are many things that authorities do, and can do, right now without the Bill. Some excellent things have been done and we encourage them. Those authorities that are not pilot authorities are able to proceed.

Local government, on a cross-party basis, has said to us that if it is able to apply a modest charge on a means-tested basis, it will have some extra resource in its local system that it can then use to improve the wider transport system. In the light of that, it is unlikely that schemes will be put to us that do not involve at least some element of charging for some people who currently receive free transport. If another scheme came forward that did do that, we would consider it. However, I find it hard from first principles to see a way in which we could get a scheme of that sort that would both fulfil the requirements of the Bill and not be something that would be allowed anyway, regardless of those requirements.

To return to what I was saying, the Bill seeks to encourage LEAs to make fairer arrangements that cater for many more children in the area. That is important and returns to some of the earlier discussion in response to the hon. Gentleman's probing amendment about the 1 mile. It considers some of those young people who currently fall outside the statutory requirements. My hon. Friends the Members for South Dorset (Jim Knight) and for Stafford have mentioned that again during today's debates.

The hon. Member for Southport was slightly too easy in his dismissal of that point in saying that there has to be a cut-off point. In this legislation we are saying that there is the possibility of having a more flexible approach than that, which could benefit a much larger number of parents and families.

The Bill aims to give local authorities that flexibility in targeting the overall subsidy for school transport more equitably and according to local priorities. We

recognise that the introduction of charges may lead to some parents shifting from buses to cars in the way that has been described. In targeting the existing subsidy and any additional revenue to a bigger proportion of the school population than currently receives free and assisted transport, the net impact is expected to be a decrease in the number of pupils travelling by car.

I accept that this is the nub of the issue: the trade off between the downside, where some of those who currently get free buses may switch to the car because of the introduction of a charge, and the people who may benefit from a subsidised bus or another improvement in local transport to school and who would therefore not use the car any longer. The devil in such things is, of course, in the detail. The purpose of the work on the prospectus and the school travel schemes and of our discussions with local government and others is to have schemes where the net effect is to reduce the car run to schools. That is critical.

All pupils who are eligible for free school meals and who go to their nearest suitable school would continue to get free school transport. We will return to that important issue when discussing later amendments.

To summarise on this amendment, the small charges that may be introduced in scheme areas, coupled with the existing large subsidy for home-to-school transport has the potential to provide revenue for improved, extended and better focused transport services for pupils. There is no public funding available to expand the current free provision. It is vital that we put as much money as possible into front-line services in schools. In many respects, the present system is unfair, because it is based on distance and not on the ability of parents to pay.

There is no agenda to remove free travel from any particular group, and the structure of the system would be entirely at the discretion of the local education authority, with important safeguards for those on low incomes. Charges must be set following local consultation, as discussed earlier, and at a level designed not to increase car use. In the light of those points, I ask the hon. Members for Southport and for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross (John Thurso) to withdraw their amendment. Before they have the opportunity to do so, I will deal with the other amendments and the new clause grouped with it.

Amendment No. 49 was moved by the hon. Member for Fareham. It would place a statutory duty on LEAs to insert details of their charging proposals in travel scheme proposals. Such details would include the basis on which charges are calculated, arrangements for increasing charges, concessionary fares, and the method of collection.

Our formal consultation on the draft Bill revealed widespread agreement among local authorities that any introduction of charges for home to school travel should be accompanied by an improvement in the services on offer. The prospectus accompanying the Bill requires scheme applications to explain what LEAs and local transport authorities are doing to

ensure that good quality, well maintained, and appropriate vehicles are used on the journey to school. The prospectus goes on to state that:

''Scheme applications must set out local charging policies, making it clear how many pupils will be charged, and the level of proposed charges.''

The hon. Gentleman asked whether we would be looking at flat-rate fees and the methods of revenue collection. We do not want to be prescriptive because such matters are best left for LEAs as they develop their schemes. However, he has raised legitimate points, particularly about methods of collection, which we need to discuss further with relevant stakeholders including head teacher associations and bus operators. That must be fully reflected in the prospectus as it is further developed.

We see the various requirements as including the details sought by the hon. Gentleman through his amendment. However, the prospectus will go further than that. It states that charges may have a differential effect in scheme areas geographically, as set out by a number of hon. Members during the debate, with some areas as net losers of public funding, and other areas gaining overall. The LEA proposals must provide transparent information about any imbalances between areas generating and absorbing charges.

The prospectus also requires scheme applicants to provide a thorough analysis of the impact of charging on different groups of pupils, as set out in the earlier debate on the needs of disabled children and those with special educational needs. It provides for ongoing monitoring and the provision of detailed financial information through annual reports, to be published as part of the overall evaluation of the scheme approach. The place to deal with the important issues raised by the hon. Gentleman is in the prospectus rather than in the Bill, and in the light of that I ask him to withdraw that amendment.

Amendment No. 33 and new clause 2 relate to the use of income gained from charges. The amendment seeks to ring-fence revenue from charges so that it is spent only on furthering the objectives of the scheme. We have made it clear at every stage—in the draft prospectus, in the Government response to the Select Committee report, and on Second Reading—that this is not a cost-cutting exercise. The relevant national authority—either the DFES or the Welsh Assembly—will not approve schemes simply about cutting costs.

The prospectus accompanying the Bill states categorically:

''LEAs are expected to fund schemes from resources already committed to funding school transport, together with any charges levied on pupils.''

It goes on to say:

''Existing funds must continue to support school travel, with budgets uprated each year in line with comparable LEAs'',

and that

''all fare income must be invested in improved services.''

To ensure that that actually happens, scheme authorities will be obliged to produce annual reports for either the DFES or the National Assembly for Wales. Those reports will contain financial annexes detailing the economics of the scheme, will form part

of the overall evaluation of schemes and will be published either by ourselves or the National Assembly.

The amendment seeks to achieve the aim I have just outlined by putting a requirement in the Bill for revenue to be spent on furthering scheme aims. It is doubtful whether the amendment would achieve its aim, as an authority which sought to reduce its overall school transport expenditure could argue that it was spending the revenue from charges on scheme aims, was merely reducing its previously existing school transport spend, and would have done so regardless of the provisions of the Bill or membership of the pilot approach. I believe that the approach outlined in the prospectus will achieve the objective set out by the hon. Gentleman and I ask him to withdraw the amendment.

New clause 2 provides that DFES and other bodies would be unable to take account of revenue raised from schemes in determining the funding provided to local education authorities. It would also ensure that LEAs could not take account of school transport costs in determining the budget shares of the schools they maintain. We have always made it clear that we expect any charges collected through school travel schemes to be reinvested in improved travel arrangements as I have just set out, which is explained in paragraph 44 of the draft prospectus.

I am happy to confirm that the DFES and the National Assembly for Wales have no intention of reducing funding to local authorities on account of income derived from charges for school transport. There are no such assumptions in our spending plans, which are modelled up to 2007-08, and we have no intention of doing so in future.

There seems to be some misunderstanding in the second part of the new clause. Home-to-school transport is a responsibility of local education authorities, not schools, and is not taken into account in any way in the delegation of funding to schools. Schools do not in general incur expenditure on home-to-school transport, and if they do so it is unlikely that such expenditure would come out of their delegated budget. That part of the clause is therefore unnecessary and not meaningful.

I hope that the hon. Gentleman will accept that the concerns he has legitimately raised today have been responded to fully.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

The battle lines have been drawn and will continue to exist. This is a question of dropping an entitlement that was meant to ensure equity of access. Whether one wants to call it flexibility, the removal of a legislative straitjacket or whatever, it is still the removal of an entitlement. It is not made any better by the Minister pleading that only a small number of pupils are affected. That seems wholly irrelevant to the issue. We do not argue that entitlement should be withdrawn simply because a few people are affected. I am unpersuaded that it is the right thing to do; I am also unpersuaded that it is worth doing.

The Minister's ingenious statistics—I should call them accurate—seem to show that better-off families are already less likely to use public transport. I simply

ask why charging them for transport when no charge existed before would make them more likely to use it. I imagine that they would not.

Nevertheless, I am minded to withdraw the amendment for procedural reasons. First, to keep my powder dry: I do not want an amendment to fail in Standing Committee leaving me unable to bring it back on Report. Secondly, there is an inelegance in the amendment because it would remove voluntary schemes such as yellow bus schemes, which might reduce current transport costs for pupils. Thirdly, judging by some contributions from the Labour Benches, I feel that we are winning a few friends on the matter, so it may not be worth pressing the point at this juncture. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I beg to move amendment No. 42, in page 3, line 4, at end insert

', or

'(c) who is a registered pupil at the nearest denominational school of the religion to which his parents adhere.'.

The amendment would include among the group of children who are able to receive free school transport those who attend a denominational school of the faith to which their parents adhere. One of the issues that affects many parents who send their children to a faith school is that many of them labour under the misapprehension that I did until I had a constituency case on the issue, and that is that school transport to such schools is free as of right. That is an issue that causes concern, as some of the discretionary travel schemes, which hitherto provided free transport to children in a denominational school, have been withdrawn and parents who wish to send their child to a denominational school have incurred charges.

We need to go back in history to understand why parents may believe that it is a right to receive free transport to a denominational school and to understand the role that guidance from the Department played in creating that sense of a right. That history will show why people may be slightly sceptical about the value of guidance, including the prospectus—history has shown that that guidance can be, and has been, ignored. In the previous debate, we referred to the Education Act 1944. Section 55 of that Act states:

''A local education authority may make such arrangements for the provision of transport and otherwise as they consider necessary or as the Minister may direct for the purpose of facilitating the attendance of pupils at schools or young people's colleges or any course or class provided in pursuance of the scheme of further education in force for their area and may pay any reasonable travelling expenses of such pupils''.

In the debate on the 1944 Act, R.A. Butler said that section 55

''is all for the purposes of enabling children to attend schools which are suited to the beliefs and desires of their parents. I can give a definitive undertaking about that.''—[Official Report, 9 May 1944; Vol. 399, c. 1753.]

That set in place a process whereby parents believed that they would get free transport to a denominational school. It is the basis for much of the transport provided to denominational schools.

The concern of the Catholic Education Service and Catholic diocese is that the Bill places at risk the concept of parents being able to educate their children according to their beliefs and wishes, as financial considerations and constraints may be substituted for the fundamental beliefs and convictions of parents who wish their child to be educated at a church school.

We must bear in mind the nature of some of the populations that attend Catholic schools. In many Catholic schools in deprived urban areas, a high proportion of children are from ethnic minorities—11 per cent. of Catholic schools have 40 per cent. ethnic minority composition, as opposed to 10 per cent. of other maintained schools. In many Catholic schools, a high proportion of children are on free school meals. So, while many would characterise faith schools as being socially exclusive, the experience of many Catholic schools in deprived urban areas is that they are socially inclusive.

As I suggested, we have started to see the erosion of discretionary schemes providing free transport for children to attend denominational schools. We have yet to see the impact of that on enrolment in Catholic schools, but we need to recognise that where Catholic schools have agreed with LEAs about the siting of schools, those schools are often sited on the basis of attracting as many children as possible from as wide a catchment area as possible, rather than the basis of maximising the number of children who get free school transport. For example, St. Benedict's college in Colchester is a school whose location was, by agreement with the LEA, specifically designed to serve the widest possible rural area. It is likely to be detrimentally affected by the imposition of charges for home-to-school transport. So the siting of new Catholic schools has been determined by the underpinning of the 1944 Act.

The provisions of that Act were replicated in section 9 of the Education Act 1996 and at various intervals some of the issues have been reiterated. A 1994 DFES circular states that

''many LEAs exercise the discretion afforded by Section 55 to provide free transport or assistance with fares for pupils or students who attend the nearest school or college of their parents' religious denomination, even though they could have attended a non-denominational institution nearer home''.

Paragraph 31 of the circular adds that

''the Secretary of State hopes that LEAs will continue to think it right not to disturb well established arrangements of the kind referred to in paragraph 29, some of which have been associated with a local agreement or understanding about the siting of denominational schools. He continues to attach importance to the preservation of the opportunity to choose a school or college in accordance with religious convictions''.

The DFES circular in 1994 set out clearly the expectations of the Secretary of State that LEAs would not disturb existing travel arrangements for children who wished to attend a denominational school when their parents adhered to that faith. Yet we have seen

the erosion of those discretionary travel schemes, despite the guidance given by the Secretary of State in 1994.

The Bill gives the opportunity, as far as the pilot areas are concerned, to bring the legislation into line with the 1994 guidance by including children who attend denominational schools within the definition of ''protected child'' and provides that where they are attending that faith school they can have free school transport. This is an important opportunity to address that issue, because a growing number of parents are seeking education for their children in a faith school. There are pressures within the Muslim community for more Muslim schools to be set up to meet their needs. The Bill provides an opportunity for us to consider what is important to parents who believe that the nearest suitable school for their child is not just down the road but is a school that educates children in their faith.

In some urban areas, where Catholic schools provide excellent quality education to a wide diversity of ethnic groups, some of the charging arrangements may preclude parents from sending their children to that school. That is a fundamental issue for many parents who send their children to faith schools. Many parents still believe that it is their right to send their children to those schools, and to have free transport to enable them to do so. The Bill should ensure that it is a right, and not simply guidance. I ask the Minister to comment on that.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

On Second Reading, the Secretary of State said that he had the ''understanding'' of the Churches, which is an interesting word. I quizzed him on that during the debate and asked him whether ''understanding'' was equivalent to wholehearted endorsement. He was honest and straightforward enough to say no, that was not the case and that there were concerns. Several Church parties have voiced their concerns to members of the Committee.

I declare an interest: I am a governor of a Catholic high school, which is the only one in my constituency. At present, providing support for travel schemes to denominational schools is discretionary, but in many authorities throughout Lancashire and Merseyside, including Sefton, in my constituency, it is almost taken as mandatory to have a large number of denominational schools; it is accepted practice, for which good arguments are presented by the Churches. A particularly important argument for them is that if there is not some kind of support for travel schemes that ensure that pupils get to denominational schools where such a school is appropriate for them, the social mix of the school will be affected. That is a concern because religious schools are often criticised for appearing to disguise social bias within a religious ethos. They rebut that accusation, but clearly they will not be assisted by a regime that ensures that getting to the school is not a problem for the well-off, but is financially burdensome for the less well-off.

It is widely accepted by most local authorities, and it is the current understanding, that for Catholics, the Church of England, Jewish adherents and Muslims, the appropriate school is a Catholic, Church of

England, Jewish or Muslim school respectively. The nearest appropriate school was the subject of considerable debate for the Select Committee. There was the celebrated case of the Abbott family, who argued that, as committed atheists, they had the right definitely not to go to the nearest Church of England school, which was not an appropriate school for them. I have a lot of sympathy with that point of view. I am not an atheist, but I can understand the intellectual coherence of the family's argument.

It is fair to say that the Churches have concerns that are entirely legitimate, well argued and forcefully put. The current rather mixed practice, whereby in some areas of the country providing transport to denominational schools is accepted as almost mandatory, and in others it does not exist at all, needs the clarity that such an amendment would provide.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

It would probably be helpful if I repeated what the Secretary of State said on Second Reading, which is that the Catholic Church certainly does have concerns. I had meetings with the Catholic Education Service to discuss the Bill, but the Church of England is supportive of it, and I am happy to place that on record.

I cannot agree to amendment No. 42 for a number of reasons, not least because we believe that it would, in practice, be incompatible with the Human Rights Act 1998. I agree with hon. Members that transport for people attending denominational schools is an important subject. It is a live issue, precisely because of the changes to discretionary practice to which the hon. Gentleman rightly referred. He reminded the Committee that transport has to be provided for pupils attending denominational schools if that is the nearest suitable school and it is outside walking distance. Pupils attend on the same footing as those who attend their neighbourhood school where that is non-denominational.

If a school travel scheme were introduced, the effect of the amendment would be that only those pupils attending non-denominational schools would be charged, and that would be illogical. It would result in charging relatively low-income pupils attending non-denominational schools for transport, when pupils from high-income families who were attending denominational schools would be exempt. That clearly raises human rights issues.

Amendment No. 42 would provide more favourable treatment to pupils attending denominational schools. The provisions would be vulnerable to challenge on grounds of unequal treatment, and the Secretary of State could not give the Bill an unqualified certificate of European convention on human rights compatibility.

It is the view of both the Government and the National Assembly for Wales, and it is confirmed by the Joint Committee on Human Rights in its report,

that the provision of free or subsided school transport must be made without discrimination on the grounds of religion or belief. Many parents exercise parental preference so that their children can attend denominational schools, and in those cases local education authorities now have no obligation to provide transport, as the hon. Gentleman rightly reminded us. It is often provided on a free or subsidised footing, but that is a discretionary not a mandatory provision. I understand that there is growing concern about that, which was reflected in what the hon. Members for Fareham and for Southport said.

A survey that we conducted two years ago with the Confederation of Education and Children's Services Managers found that 120 of 150 authorities still provided free transport for pupils who live outside the statutory walking distances and travel to denominational schools that are not otherwise their nearest suitable school, provided that they met a number of eligibility criteria such as baptism or regular church attendance. However, at least 30 LEAs make charges for providing transport for pupils attending denominational schools, unless they are eligible for free school meals. As the hon. Member for Fareham said, some of the charges are very high, such as those in Portsmouth, where according to the 2002 survey the figure was £500 per pupil.

The pattern of denominational provision varies enormously. The hon. Gentleman mentioned the north-west of England; in Liverpool, 53 per cent. of secondary schools are denominational, and in Lancashire that figure is 32 per cent. However, there are no denominational schools in some areas, such as Cornwall and North Somerset. Authorities with a high level of denominational provision might be unable to put together school travel plans if they are obliged to provide free transport to all pupils attending denominational schools. We do not think that it is fair to limit participation in the pilot scheme in that way.

In my discussions with the Churches, I said that the Bill could provide a vehicle for improving school transport for those attending denominational schools because it is discretionary, and because a number of authorities are choosing to cut back on provision and increase charges. If a scheme is successful in improving the availability of a number of transport services including buses, some of the pupils attending denominational schools could be beneficiaries of that. It is important to put that on the record.

For the reasons that I have given, I do not believe that the amendment is workable in the context of the Bill, and I ask the hon. Gentleman to withdraw it.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I take on board the Minister's comments about how the amendment would work in practice, but I am concerned that when charging is introduced, parents who currently send their children to a denominational school that is not their nearest school will have to pay more to send them to that school. In my constituency, the nearest school is north of Portsmouth or in Southampton, both of which are more than three miles away.

The risk is that parents who want their children to attend a faith school will be charged, but if they choose to send them to the nearest state school they will face no charge because the school will be less than three miles away. The financial disincentive arising from charging inhibits parents' choice in the education of their children. The amendment refers to religious faith, but it could have mentioned philosophy, for example—or atheism, which the hon. Member for Southport mentioned. We will address the Welsh language shortly.

There is a serious issue here. Both major parties want to encourage school choice, but such measures can dissuade parents from exercising that choice, particularly when the school in question is further away than another school.

John Pugh (Liberal Democrat, Southport)

Does the hon. Gentleman agree that there is an anomaly in what the Minister said? I do not want to open a can of worms, but he seemed to say that because of human rights legislation it is inappropriate for transport purposes to regard a denominational school as the nearest appropriate school—but it appears that most LEAs, and the Government, are prepared to regard a denominational school as the nearest appropriate school for admissions purposes.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I take the hon. Gentleman's comments on board. Admission arrangements are a topic for a new debate, and one that I am sure we shall have in due course. I am concerned that the Bill does not give additional support to parents who wish to send their

children to a denominational school; it is regrettable that that opportunity has not been taken. However, I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I beg to move amendment No. 43, in

clause 1, page 3, line 4, at end insert

', or

'(d) who is a registered pupil at a Welsh-language school.'.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I shall not take the opportunity to wax lyrical about Welsh language schools at this stage in the debate. It is a pity that the Welsh Assembly has not had the opportunity to complete its scrutiny of the Bill, because its own observations would furnish greater arguments for making sure that there was reference in the Bill to enabling children who wished to speak Welsh to attend a Welsh language school free of charge. I should be grateful if the Minister would response to that brief point.

Stephen Twigg (Labour, Enfield, Southgate)

The subject of the amendment is similar to that of the previous amendment. We all share the desire to support parents who have to make choices that involve travelling great distances. In practice, however, this amendment raises exactly the same human rights and other implications as were raised by the previous amendment. I ask the hon. Gentleman to withdraw the amendment, for the same reasons.

Mark Hoban (Conservative, Fareham)

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Further consideration adjourned.—[Vernon Coaker.]

Adjourned accordingly at nine minutes to Five o'clock till Thursday 11 November at twenty-five minutes past Nine o'clock.