Plan to scrap faith school bus support

Lancashire youngsters who attend faith schools are a step nearer losing help with bus fares.
Coun Susie CharlesCoun Susie Charles
Coun Susie Charles

Families are being urged to make sure they take part in a public consultation exercise being carried out by Lancashire County Council on its plans to scrap the denominational transport grant.

The amount of support given to pupils who attend faith schools, but live closer to an available non-faith school, has been cut in recent years.

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At present, families who choose to send their children to a faith school, rather than their nearest school, have to make a contribution of £540 per child towards the cost of this transport, rising to £575 in September 2017, but the county council says the subsidy still costs £400,000 a year.

The authority is one of the few councils in the country paying the subsidy and is now consulting.

Coun Susie Charles, Cabinet Member for Children, Young People and Schools, said: “The council faces a challenging financial situation which means that we need to consult on a number of extremely difficult decisions on how we allocate our resources.

“We need to look at all of our spending, especially on services that we have no legal requirement to provide. “

Low income families won’t be affected. Consultation closes on July 21.