School Bus Blues

I am delighted that the County Council as managed to see its way towards helping those parents in Acton and Great Waldingfield who were threatened with losing their school transport this week. This has been something of a cliffhanger for all!

I know that the parents concerned would be the first to acknowledge that the service that was withdrawn was in fact only a discretionary one.  This is due to the fact that they had chosen, often for very good reason, to send their children to school outside their normal catchment area.  This meant that the County Council had no absolute legal obligation to provide seats on the bus.

However, in my opinion, it is the role of government to help rather than hinder citizens, and by brokering a deal with a private bus company for the current school year, the County Council has fulfilled its clear moral obligations.  As Portia said in her great speech in the Merchant of Venice:

'earthly power doth then show likest God's
When mercy seasons justice'.

and mercy has  clearly seasoned justice in this case.  

The area where I do feel that the County was at fault was not to inform the parents concerned of their decision to withdraw the service until a few days before term began.  Initially I found it hard to believe that officers were unaware of the problem until the eleventh hour.  However, knowing that very often in the world of government one hand does not know what the other hand is doing, suspect that there was something of the sort operating here.

This does need to change.  We pay lip service to joined up government, but much more effort is needed to make the good intentions in this respect a reality.

This is carping a little however:  well done to Graham Newman, the Cabinet Member for Education, and his team, for resolving this issue at literally the eleventh hour.  I was happy and relieved to glimpse the children waiting for the bus yesterday morning.