5th October 2011

BRIDPORT: No room on the bus with empty seats

by Tom Glover

ANGRY parents are calling for Dorset County Council to let their daughter have a seat on a school bus - after seeing it pass their road every morning with empty seats.

Parents Alan and Helen Lake, whose daughter Zoe’s application for a concessionary pass was unsuccessful, say they have seen a school bus pass along Burton Road every morning with up to 10 empty seats.

The family say they cannot understand why they are not allowed to pay for their daughter to have a seat on the bus but DCC have defended their position saying that all seats have been allocated on that route and stating that they have a “legal duty” to hold back a small number of seats for families whose children are entitled to free school transport.

Zoe Lake, 11, is in year seven at the Sir John Colfox School and lives 2.7 miles away from the school. She said: “It’s annoying because the bus is literally at the bottom of my road and I can’t get on it, yet I know people who are on it. I’d rather get the bus than be picked up because it’s wasting our family’s money, which could be spent on other things.

“I’d rather be able to get the bus with my mates. I used to walk to my old school but I’d feel a bit unsafe having to walk to Colfox.”

Zoe’s father Alan explained that if Zoe were to use public transport to get to and from school she would have to catch four separate buses each day and would leave the house before 7am and return after 5pm.

Mr Lake, who runs his own floor installation business, has had to stop taking on work and has applied for a part-time job so he can fit in his work around the school run.

Mr Lake said: “People want to get on the school bus, and our willing to pay for it, we just want the council to get their finger out and organise it now not later. It will be pitch black very soon and if I have to work overtime in the run up to Christmas Zoe will be put in a vulnerable situation, having to walk the three miles home in the dark. If it was their children they wouldn’t put up with it at all.”

Mr Lake said he was originally told by the DCC that there was no school bus that stopped on the Burton Road, was then told there was a bus with no seats, and has since been told there are spaces but the DCC won’t be able to process all applications until November.

“They’ve manipulated the situation and changed the goalposts everytime,” he said.

“They’ve said there is no bus, then they said its full up and now there is a bus with seats available but they can only allocate so many spaces.

“If there are spaces and people who want them then that’s the end of the story, they can’t say there are spaces but you can’t have them just in case someone else wants them later.

“If the service wasn’t there I wouldn’t have an argument but there is a bus that goes past the bottom of my road with seats with no-one sitting on them and we are not just talking about one or two spare seats, its six or seven. I’ve actually counted ten spaces at times.

“We’ve got the information here, we can tell them how many seats are on that bus and how many children would like a seat on that bus. If it takes them until November to work that out then I think it shows that someone somewhere should be sacked or should be bought a calculator and be sent back to school themselves.”

A Dorset County Council spokesman said that there were 1,000 fewer concessionary seats available this year due to changes in routes and bus sizes, and that those who had missed out on a seat were currently on a waiting list.

“We are processing a high number of late applications and have had to hold back a small number of seats for families whose children are entitled to free school transport,” they said.

“If we did not do this, we would not be fulfilling our legal duty.”

In reference to the Lake family’s situation, a DCC spokesperson said the route would be assessed in the near future.

“All seats on the bus that stops at Burton Road have been allocated,” they said.

“However, we will be sending our crew and compliance officer to travel this particular route to see who is and who isn’t using their pass and will review the situation once we’ve processed the late applications.”

PHOTO - FRUSTRATED: Helen Lake wants her daughter Zoe to have a seat on a school bus

BRIDPORT: No room on the bus with empty seats

BRIDPORT: No room on the bus with empty seats

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