Tory-led plans for home to school transport represents “another raid on household budgets”, according to Labour.
The Coalition running Durham County Council will meet this week to try and force through plans for a £2 charge introduced for the Standard and Maintained Concessionary Scheme, which will impact on parents of children with special educational needs.
Labour has hit out at the proposals, outlining how they will have a catastrophic impact on low-income households, particularly those with more than one child.
It is also critical of the consultation process, which was not promoted (receiving just 324 responses) and has left many parents and carers upset about the future for their children and the impact on their education and welfare, and also on their financial situation.
Cllr Stacey Denali, Labour’s Shadow Portfolio Holder for Families, said:
“When a decision is required to help people in County Durham, you can guarantee this Coalition will go against it.
“It has refused to acknowledge a social care crisis, refused to call Government austerity to account, refused to back the Universal Credit uplift and refused to back Labour’s proposals that would have protected residents from their last two Council Tax hikes.
“This is just the latest in a string of raids on household budgets and comes just weeks after they raised Council Tax by five percent. We are in the teeth of a cost of living crisis – just how much more do they want families and people in County Durham to pay?”
At Wednesday’s Cabinet, the Coalition is set to agree a £2 charge for the Standard and Maintained Concessionary Scheme and approve promotion of a Personal Travel Budget for parents and carers of children with SEND, pushing the responsibility of finding affordable transport onto families and placing even greater pressures on families to ensure their child can get to and from school.
“Due to restrictions around how this money can be spent, the move has the potential to force many working parents and carers to reduce working hours to transport children to and from school with zero funding,” added Cllr Denali. “This will create an even greater burden on household finances at a time when everyone is struggling.”
Durham County Council has a statutory duty to provide Home to School Transport for youngsters meeting criteria set by the Department for Education. It currently provides transport for over 9,000 young people, with estimated costs set to increase to £29.1m.
Cllr Jake Miller, Shadow Portfolio Role for Connectivity and Inclusion, said:
“The financial impact will be huge, but there are other worrying aspects in this new policy being forced through by the Coalition, including a move towards reviews of individual needs for those receiving single person transport – mostly children with SEND.
“They talk about creating ‘hubs’ for young people to be picked up collectively, which raises many safeguarding concerns. Children with SEND can be more vulnerable, sometimes struggling to get from the house to a taxi never mind make their way to a hub. Why on earth would anyone vote through policy that effectively makes life harder for some of our most financially impacted and vulnerable people?
“It makes no sense and Labour will not back these fundamentally cruel changes.”