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Full school means Carlisle kids as young as four being sent off alone in cabs
Children as young as four have to travel unaccompanied across Carlisle in taxis because their local school has been declared full.
Alison and Andrew Bernard with five-year-old LilyThe mother of one five-year-old girl who is among the school-children now facing unsupervised daily taxi trips to school described the situation as a “scandal,” while a national charity dubbed the policy “irresponsible.”
Carlisle MP Eric Martlew highlighted the issue after revealing there are up to 20 families whose children have been refused places at Kingmoor and Stanwix schools.
He said he is appalled by the human cost now being paid for the closure last year of Belah Primary School.
At the time, the Tory-LibDem alliance controlling Cumbria County Council said the move was necessary because of dwindling pupil numbers.
They gave an assurance there would be enough places for children in the Kingmoor and Stanwix catchment.
Alison Bernard, 44, and her husband Andrew, 47, of Riverbank Court, Etterby, have been told there is no room at Kingmoor Infant School for their five-year-old daughter Lily.
Education bosses have allocated her a place at Caldew Lea Primary, on Ashley Street, on the opposite side of Carlisle.
Cumbria County Council pays school taxi fares for children such as Lily until they are seven but not for parents. Only pupils with special needs are allowed a chaperone.
The authority defended the policy, saying all the taxi drivers involved in the transport of children have to undergo stringent background checks every three years.
But Mrs Bernard said: “They want me to put our little five-year-old girl in a taxi every morning, and then wave goodbye to her, without any kind of chaperone.
“I’ve been told there are some four-year-olds who were refused admission to Stanwix who are already doing this. I think the whole idea is an obscene scandal.
“I wouldn’t put all my most treasured possessions in a taxi and then send them off to the other end of the city.
“Lily is more precious to us than anything, so there’s no way we’re going to do that to her. I don’t know any parent who’d be happy to do that to so young a child.”
Mrs Bernard said she asked council officials what would happen if her daughter needed to use the toilet during her taxi journey to school.
“The man I spoke to told me that all the taxi drivers are issued with incontinence pads to protect the seats.
“We adopted Lily and she’s already very nervous of strangers. She knows what’s going on and keeps saying: please mum, don’t send me off in a taxi. This is causing stress for the whole family.”
The family say it will cost around £70 a week in taxi fares for Lily, but they are now considering home educating their daughter instead.
Eric Martlew blamed the situation on the decision last year of the then alliance controlled County Council to close Belah Primary.
He urged Cumbria County Council to improve primary school provision in the north of the Carlisle.
The MP accused the former Tory LibDem controlled council of misleading parents by claiming there would be enough places for children in the Kingmoor and Stanwix School catchments.
The authority’s chief executive repeated the claim to him in a letter two months ago, he said.
Mr Martlew said: “This is patently untrue. Parents have contacted me having been unable to get their children into either Stanwix or Kingmoor Schools.
“They’ve been offered Houghton, Blackford, Caldew Lea and Brook Street.
“That means some parents are being told to put their unaccompanied four-year-old into a taxi to take him over two miles to school.
“I’m hoping the new Labour controlled County Council will review the situation and introduce measures so that young children from the area can be educated in their communities and that new people moving into the area can be assured their children will be educated locally.
“It’s appalling that we have found ourselves in this position because they closed a school which they should never have closed.”
The MP said he knows of one mother who is walking the two miles from north to south Carlisle with her child while another is taking two buses rather than send her child alone in a taxi.
Belah’s Conservative councillor David Morton said: “For the authority to suggest that parents should put a five-year-old girl in a taxi on her own for a two mile journey is absolutely appalling.
“The County Council were told closing Belah School was a disaster and now the warnings have come to fruition.
“Things will only get worse with the proposals to build a thousand or so extra houses in this locality.”
Labour are now the majority party on Cumbria County Council, holding five of the ten cabinet seats, with the remaining five vacant.
Council Leader Stewart Young said he too was concerned about the situation, which he said his party inherited from the previous Lib Dem administration.
He said: “There’s now a major problem created north of the river by that decision. Eric Martlew has spoken to me about it and we’ve now asked our officers to investigate whether there might be a practical solution.”
Despite the concerns, Cumbria County Council defended the policy. A spokesperson said: “All our drivers and escorts are CRB (criminal record bureau) checked and rechecked every three years.
“All carry identification badges which authorises them to work on Cumbria County Council transport contracts.
“All 'unaccompanied' travel involves a driver.
“Every primary school child entitled to transport in Cumbria will travel 'unaccompanied' unless they have special educational needs. They will then be generally provided with an escort.
“This is in line with most local authorities in the UK.”
We would have no objection to parents travelling with pupils to school where there is space in the vehicle but they would be subject to the same rigorous checks as the drivers."
But Claude Knights, of the children’s charity Kidscape, said of the authority’s use of taxis to ferry children unaccompanied to school: “I’ve never heard anything like this. It’s astonishingly irresponsible and opens up a huge child protection chasm.
“It’s an accident waiting to happen and something we will be looking into.”
Former Conservative Council Leader Tim Stoddart said the Belah School closure decision was made on the basis that there would be enough places for local children at the local Kingmoor and Stanwix primary schools.
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Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.
George Carlin
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