Home to School Transport Provision 2022-23
North Lanarkshire Council · 29 September 2022
Back to Policy and Strategy Committee — 29 September 2022 and its agenda
Text extracted from the council's PDF. Layout and reading order may differ from the original.
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1 North Lanarkshire Council Report Policy & Strategy Committee Does this report require to be approved? ☐ Yes ☒ No Ref: GMcL Date 29/09/22 Home to School Transport Provision 2022/23 From Gerard McLaughlin, Head of Education (North) E-mail mclaughling@northlan.gov.uk Telephone 01236 812269 Executive Summary On 16 August 2022 Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT) contacted North Lanarkshire Council to advise that they had failed in their contractual obligation to arrange transport for over 1600 children and young people due to attend our schools the next day. The failure affected over 40 individual contract routes and came despite previous communication from SPT, as late as 08 August 2022, indicating that over 99% of all contracts were in place. This position confirmed by information available to us at that time via SPT’s shared management information system (Axiom). In response to SPT’s failure to plan, deliver and communicate, Education and Families set up a Transport Emergency Group under the Corporate Resilience Framework to design and implement a plan of complex and far-reaching actions designed to mitigate a series of significant consequences and impacts. As of 25 August 2002, all children and young people affected now have a transport offering in place. We continue to work to improve temporary arrangements on an ongoing basis. Recommendations It is recommended that the Policy & Strategy Committee: (1) Endorse the contents of this report. (2) Endorse the internal review and joint review with SPT, noting that elected members will receive reports on the outcome of these reviews. The Plan for North Lanarkshire Priority Support all children and young people to realise their full potential Ambition statement (7) Enhance collaborative working to maximise support and ensure all our children and young people are included, supported, and safe
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2 1. Background 1.1 North Lanarkshire Council provide free school transport to over 8000 children and young people. Almost all is provided by external contractors using agreed procurement practice. The provision of free school transport is one of the largest non-staffing costs within Education and Families budget. Section 51 of the Education (Scotland) Act 1980 requires local authorities to make such arrangements as they consider necessary for the provision of school transport for pupils attending schools in their area. Local authorities have a wide level of discretion in this regard, but arrangements will take account of factors such as safe walking distance, pupil safety, placing requests, vacant seats, medical conditions, and additional support needs. 1.2 Strathclyde Partnership for Transport (SPT) is the Regional Transport Partnership for the West of Scotland. SPT was formed in 2006 as part of the transport framework created by the Scottish Government, which is made up of a national transport agency, Transport Scotland, and seven Regional Transport Partnerships. 1.3 The SPT remit comprises of the following council areas: East Dunbartonshire, East Ayrshire, East Renfrewshire, Glasgow City, Inverclyde, North Ayrshire, North Lanarkshire, Renfrewshire, South Ayrshire, South Lanarkshire, West Dunbartonshire and the Helensburgh and Lomond area of Argyll and Bute. 1.4 SPT’s role involves planning and delivering transport solutions for all modes of transport across the region, in conjunction with member councils and industry partners. In respect of our school transport the key role undertaken by SPT is in the procurement and management of mainstream home to school bus contracts. 1.5 SPT and Council obligations are outlined within an agency agreement. This is reviewed every three years and was last reviewed in 2020. 1.6 A process of providing exceptional payments to contractors during Covid was implemented during lockdown. 2. Report Standard Arrangements for Mainstream Home to School Transport 2.1 The following describes the agreed process for ensuring transport of pupils to school: • Pupils entitled to transport are added to SPT supplied Axiom database • This database and associated systems within SPT calculate route/runs required over several years based on pupil data • SPT tender these contracts on our behalf subject to our final approval • SPT tendering takes place from June through to August • SPT inform parents/carers of allocated contractors • SPT manage and ensure MOT, Insurance and PVG other compliance. (Current NLC policy stipulates six monthly MOT checks and a maximum vehicle age of 20 years). • SPT manage ongoing contract compliance. There is a contractual obligation that should any issues arise at any stage of these processes, SPT should inform us through usual regular contact to allow proper risk management and implementation of mitigations where required.
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3 Incident 2.2 What transpired on Tuesday 16 August can be best described as a systemic market failure that affected several local authorities, but with greater impact on the North Lanarkshire area. Subsequent to the catastrophic event, immediate contingency planning and activity took place to mitigate the impact on families. 2.3 The first confirmation of any issue was received by SPT on the morning of 16 August, advising that 25 bus contracts were unfulfilled. This escalated to 45 contracts – affecting more than 1600 pupils – by the afternoon of 16 August. 2.4 Prior to this there had been no forewarning of the scale of the potential impact beyond routine levels. By way of example, communication between SPT and Education and Families officers on 08/08/22 pointed to 99% of all contracts (approximately 250 in total) being awarded at that time. Later communication indicated 13 contracts would be withdrawn and re-awarded on a temporary basis but not withdrawn completely Impacts 2.5 Routes and Pupils Affected Date Routes Pupil Numbers Wednesday 17/08 46 1648 Thursday 18/08 32 1317 Friday 19/08 31 1314 Monday 22/08 10 115 Tuesday 23/08 4 60 Wednesday 24/08 1* 45 Thursday 25/08 1* 45 Friday 26/08 0 0 *not identified by SPT 2.7 In parallel, there were several knock-on consequences to the failure of SPT to deliver this number of contracts. These included greater difficulty in arranging ASN transport as there was less capacity to access the supply of providers of transport. The service prioritised fulfilling ASN contracts and has now resolved all ASN contracts. Financial Impacts 2.8 SPT Annual Cost/Budget Projections 2.8.1 At the start of each financial year SPT provide authorities with an estimate of the financial cost for each home to school contract they have administered on our behalf. The estimate for financial year 2022/23 is attached. This represents circa 240 individual contracts (home to school runs) at a total value of £7.639m. 2.8.2 Pre-Covid, SPT would re-tender a percentage (normally 1/3) of contracts each year on a rolling programme so that the annual estimate would include a number of previously agreed contracts which were still running, and newly tendered contracts. 2.8.3 However, due to the impact of Covid all of our SPT contracts had to be re-tendered as at August 2022. In the intervening period contracts which had elapsed had been ‘rolled forward’ to ensure service security and continuity. This was because it was impossible to renegotiate these arrangements during the pandemic response.
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4 (This ‘roll forward’ approach was similarly adopted during Covid in respect of ASN taxi contracts which are administered internally, and which have also had to be re-tendered as a single tranche as at August 2022). 2.8.4 In terms of the roll forward of contracts, SPT had full visibility of this and, in line with the contracted role, our view is that they should have prepared accordingly. No challenge or concern was raised at any prior stage. Officers in South Lanarkshire Council advise of the same position in that area. Financial Impact on Waste and Fleet Service 2.9 The contingency measures put in place have also resulted in several existing ASN fleet drivers being reassigned to mainstream provision. This in turn resulted in professional drivers from the Council’s Waste service being transferred into the ASN provision to ensure continuity of service provision at the expense of recyclate collections within Waste. 2.91 The above measure has resulted in additional costs to the Council immediately and in the future: • Agency drivers now being hired to backfill the ASN provision to allow all waste drivers to be transferred back to allow the reintroduction of all Waste Services. • Increased overtime through driver familiarisation and the introduction and coordination of the new mainstream routes. • Increased staffing at the recycling centres to provide additional capacity for paper/card disposal and collection during the cessation of the kerbside collection. 2.92 The suspension of the Council’s paper/card collection has had significant negative publicity including both national news coverage and considerable social media comments Authority Payments to SPT 2.10 Payments are made by authorities to SPT via an agency agreement. 2.10.1 There are fixed dates each financial when a payment is made. The scheduled payment dates/values for the 2022/23 financial year are highlighted in the table below: Quarter 1 Quarter 2 Quarter 3 Quarter 4 Total Month 5 May 2022 4 Aug 2022 3 Nov 2022 2 Feb 2023 N/A Value £1.909m £1.909m £1.909m £1.909m £7.639m 2.10.2 These scheduled payments are based on the annual estimate previously provided by SPT. In addition, there is an annual review/reconciliation process whereby SPT assess the actual costs incurred by authorities during the year compared to the original estimate and will thereafter issue a rebate or further request for payment. 2.10.3 Typically the Service has received a rebate as part of the reconciliation process. For example, during financial year 2021/22 the original SPT estimate was £6.755m, in comparison to the actual full year payment of £6.551m.
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5 2.10.4 The scheduled payment to SPT for 2022/23 is aggregated as follows: SPT Forecast Costs 2022/23 £m Fixed School Contracts 7.328 Use of Temporary Contracts 0.125 Agency Fee 0.185 Advertising 0.001 Total 7.639 Contractual position 2.10.5 Given the extent of the failure by SPT, it is incumbent upon us to review contractual arrangements. On 16 August 2022, SPT advised us that those 38 contracts due to run the next day could not be fulfilled. 2.10.6 As a broad indicator the estimated full year cost of these 38 contracts for 2022/23 was originally estimated by SPT as £0.962m. 2.10.7 Appropriate action under the terms of the contract is being considered by Legal and Democratic Solutions. Anticipated Transport Overspend 2.11 The Service was previously anticipating a combined mainstream and ASN transport overspend of more than £2m during 2022/23. 2.11.1 It is highly likely that the necessary contingency arrangements we have adopted and approved to mitigate this failure will result in additional unfunded cost pressures. Officers will continue to track justifiable internal and external additional costs the Council has incurred with a view to seeking appropriate recompense from SPT. Reputational Impacts 2.12 Despite full acceptance of responsibility and a full public apology by SPT, the damage to our reputation as a result of this failure is potentially significant. The failure by SPT to provide transport has been covered widely on social and mainstream media. 2.12.1 The council’s communication team has worked closely with Education and Families to keep parents/carers and the wider public aware of ongoing developments. Considerable resource has been allocated to creating and updating a dedicated web page that provides a central, credible source of information with the most up to date advice for parents/carers, generating almost 100,000 views over the eight days it has been live. To direct people to this page, a total number of 92,837 messages via SMS text or email have been sent over the same period directly to parents/carers of the schools affected. This activity was supported by social media content (400,000 impressions, 3,000 shares, 3,000 comments and 4,000 link clicks on Facebook and 126,000 impressions, 120 retweets, 116 replies and 3,000 link clicks on Twitter) to ensure those people most affected had access to the latest information.
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6 Mitigating Factors 2.13 SPT advised that the principal reasons for contract failure are: • A lack of qualified drivers in the general workforce • Fewer contractors available in the Lanarkshire area • A significantly larger number of contracts requiring renewal 2.13.1 Furthermore, it should be noted that we apply an enhanced statutory transportation policy to pupils in the area. This is more generous than most local authorities. Area Primary Pupils (miles) Secondary Pupils (miles) Statutory Minimum 2 3 North Lanarkshire 1 2 Review of events 2.14 SPT, in its own report (Appendix 1), has committed both to its own internal review and a joint review with the council. The council will participate fully in this review and, in addition, will carry out an internal review. The outcome of both these reviews will be reported to elected members. 2.15 At this early stage, the reviews will have to consider specific mitigations that could be deployed to counteract market volatility. In general, these can be categorised as being about reducing our transport demand or improving our levels of supply. They include: • Whether the enhanced provision beyond statutory distance is sustainable in real terms • Whether the council can supplement private provision through sourcing of vehicles and drivers • Whether the current council policy in respect of MOT is sustainable • Whether an expansion of parental expenses scheme (currently offered to ASN) could mitigate demand • Whether more use if service buses would help to increase supply in a safe and sustainable manner These and other potential mitigations will be fully explored as part of the review and reported to elected members. 3. Measures of success N/A
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7 4. Supporting documentation 4.1 Appendix 1 – SPT Committee Report “Home to School Transport” – 26 August 202 Gerard McLaughlin Head of Education (North)
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8 Impacts ( http://connect/report-template-guidance ) 5.1 Public Sector Equality Duty and Fairer Scotland Duty Does the report contain information that has an impact as a result of the Public Sector Equality Duty and/or Fairer Scotland Duty? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? If Yes, has an assessment been carried out and published on the council’s website? https://www.northlanarkshire.gov.uk/your-community/equalities/equality-and-fairer- scotland-duty-impact-assessments Yes ☐ No ☒ 5.2 Financial impact Does the report contain any financial impacts? Yes ☒ No ☐ If Yes, have all relevant financial impacts have been discussed and agreed with Financial Solutions? Yes ☐ No ☐ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? Impacts considered within the report at 2.8 and 2.9. It is highly likely there will be a significant uplift in costs from financial year 2021/22. This was initially estimated at around 20% due to known market forces. However, the very late award of commercial contracts by SPT, including contingency arrangements such as bus lease, and the resultant lack of available competition will likely increase this further. 5.3 HR policy impact Does the report contain any HR policy or procedure impacts? Yes ☒ No ☐ If Yes, have all relevant HR impacts have been discussed and agreed with People and Organisational Development? Yes ☒ No ☐ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? A key contingency in addressing the lack of contract awards by SPT has been the use of 10 leased coaches. SPT advised that drivers could not be provided. This meant the re-allocation of some of our existing refuse vehicle drivers on a temporary basis. Also, the re-allocation of some of our Learning Assistants to provide escort duties on certain routes. 5.4 Legal impact Does the report contain any legal impacts (such as general legal matters, statutory considerations (including employment law considerations), or new legislation)? Yes ☒ No ☐ If Yes, have all relevant legal impacts have been discussed and agreed with Legal and Democratic Solutions? Yes ☒ No ☐ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? Impacts considered within the report. This includes an analysis of the current agreement with SPT and potential default position. Work has also been carried out to ensure contingency arrangements around the 10 lease coaches are fully compliant and subject to formal agreement including areas such as insurance,
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9 maintenance, servicing, MOT, cleaning, accident reporting, operator’s licence and large bus permits. 5.5 Data protection impact Does the report / project / practice contain or involve the processing of personal data? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, is the processing of this personal data likely to result in a high risk to the data subject? Yes ☐ No ☐ If Yes, has a Data Protection Impact Assessment (DPIA) been carried out and e- mailed to dataprotection@northlan.gov.uk Yes ☐ No ☐ 5.6 Technology / Digital impact Does the report contain information that has an impact on either technology, digital transformation, service redesign / business change processes, data management, or connectivity / broadband / Wi-Fi? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? Where the impact identifies a requirement for technology, has an assessment been carried out (or scheduled) by the Enterprise Architecture Governance Group (EAGG)? Yes ☐ No ☐ 5.7 Environmental / Carbon impact Does the report / project / practice contain information that has an impact on any environmental or carbon matters? Yes ☐ No ☒ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? 5.8 Communications impact Does the report contain any information that has an impact on the council’s communications activities? Yes ☒ No ☐ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the impact? Impacts considered in report. The relates to a considerable volume of public and individual information which has been updated regularly as issues emerge. In addition, there has been regular contact with local and national press. Education and Families is managing a considerable rise in volume of queries around school transport including those from elected members. 5.9 Risk impact Is there a risk impact? Yes ☒ No ☐ If Yes, please provide a brief summary of the key risks and potential impacts, highlighting where the risk(s) are assessed and recorded (e.g. Corporate or Service or Project Risk Registers), and how they are managed? Key risks emerging from SPT’s failure to award contracts in time have been identified. These include financial, legislative, and reputational. These are being managed via risk capture process.
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Operations 26 August 2022 - Mainstream Home to School Transport - Update Page 1 of 5 Mainstream Home to School Transport - Update Committee Operations Date of meeting 26 August 2022 Date of report 25 August 2022 Report by Chief Executive 1. Object of report To update the Committee in relation to Mainstream Home to School Transport. Members are advised this report does not relate to Additional Support Needs (ASN) school transport. 2. Background Under agency agreements with 11 councils in the west of Scotland, SPT manages, monitors and maintains provision of Mainstream Home to School Transport (HST). This is achieved through the procurement of contracted services from commercial bus & coach operators, taxi and minibus providers. This combination of operators is required as the complexity of school travel takes account of distance travelled, location of pupils to specific schools, and number of children to be collected on specific routes. To that end, SPT typically has approximately 1,200 contracts in place, ensuring nearly 36,000 primary and secondary children get to school and home again, completing around 72,000 journeys per day. In 2021/22 the total budget for HST was circa £27 million. In 2022/23 the total budget for HST increased to £35 million. The performance of operators in providing services in fulfilment of these school contracts is actively monitored by our team of compliance inspectors, whose role it is to ensure that the vehicles and service provided meet the safety requirements, contract specification and quality criteria stipulated by each council. Normally, around 300 to 400 HST contracts are renewed annually on a rolling basis, covering all of the 11 council areas. However, given restrictions in place during the Covid 19 pandemic, and following government procurement guidance, SPT on behalf of our councils put in place over 369 temporary one-year contracts in 2020/21 and 760 in 2021/22 in order to maintain HST operations given the uncertainties faced. Resultingly, ahead of the 2022/23 school term, and in line with our standard procedures, SPT advertised more than 900 contract renewals (to provide HST for over 36,000 pupils), on a phased basis during the period from January to June 2022, with contract terms ranging from one to five years in duration. As members will be aware, the need to tender such services is a legal procurement requirement. Details on the Invitation to Tender (ITT) dates & contract volumes by council are detailed in Appendix 1 for reference. In total 852 contracts were recommended for award ahead Agenda Item 6 Appendix 1 - SPT Committee Report “Home to School Transport” – 26 August 2022
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Operations 26 August 2022 - Mainstream Home to School Transport - Update Page 2 of 5 of the school term, with temporary contract offers received for the remainder. However, a substantial number of contracts were subsequently declined by commercial operators, in the days before schools returned, in particular 46 contracts were declined at short notice for North Lanarkshire Council (NLC) schools, and a further 16 for South Lanarkshire Council (SLC) schools, respectively. Operators cited lack of driver availability, fuel price volatility and wider inflationary pressures amongst reasons for declining contracts, many doing so only in the days before the school term commenced. 3. Update Significant work by SPT’s school transport team goes into contract specification, tendering, driver clearance through the Protection of Vulnerable Groups (PVG) scheme, contract award, and service monitoring. All contract specifications are approved by individual councils. Details on current contracts, number of pupils carried and outcomes of service monitoring is reported in the “Monitoring report on public transport services & facilities in the SPT area”, which forms a separate report to this Committee. The provision of school transport is timebound in that contracts must be in place for the start of each school term, specifically the August return after the summer holidays. As could be expected, preparatory work in advance of the August term is particularly intense but, in preparing for the start of the 2022-23 school year, officers were mindful that the circumstances in which contracts were being specified and tendered was unprecedented for a range of reasons. From previous reports, members will be aware that the current commercial bus market in the west of Scotland is struggling to attain a sustainable position for future operation due to a significant decline in patronage; current figures show that bus patronage in the SPT area is around 70-75% of pre-Covid pandemic levels. The impact of this is compounded by the fact that, again due to the impact of the pandemic, operators have encountered issues in regard to the recruitment and retention of staff, specifically drivers, many of whom have chosen to pursue an alternative career path after the pandemic. It is worth highlighting that, in seeking to address this issue, SPT took the positive step of hosting a bus driver recruitment event at Buchanan Bus Station in January 2022, in partnership with affected operators. Further, members are advised that commercial operators of registered services received Covid support during and up to Autumn 2022, when it is due to end. This funding has played a fundamental role in sustaining the registered bus network, albeit at a reduced level than pre-Covid. In relation to school transport Covid support, it is worth highlighting that, following discussion with SPT, operators were paid a proportion of their contract costs by councils during the pandemic without having to provide a service, in order to sustain the market during that time. The proportion of the contract cost paid by councils varied across the region, ranging from 25%-75%. This unprecedented, ongoing and emerging scenario has created a ‘perfect storm’ for organisations such as SPT in seeking to ensure the provision of socially necessary bus services and contracts for school transport. The financial strain of passenger decline, staff issues, and future uncertainty created by the impending loss of Network Support Grants (NSG) has made operators wary and risk averse in formally committing to any new work – and this is not an issue unique to the West of Scotland. The coach operators and taxi providers who make up a sizeable proportion of school transport provision in some areas could be said to have faced even more challenging times than bus operators during the pandemic, given their core markets (e.g. events and tourism) all but collapsed at that time.
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Operations 26 August 2022 - Mainstream Home to School Transport - Update Page 3 of 5 However, as schools returned in the week ending 19 August, bus provision had been secured to ensure that around 95% of pupils across the 11 council areas were taken to and from school for the start of their term. Regrettably, however, as the week progressed, and despite SPT having secured school transport for over 80% of North Lanarkshire Council (NLC) pupils, it became clear that an issue was emerging in being able to secure sufficient HST for around 1,600 NLC pupils (and over 300 SLC pupils), as the operators to be awarded the relevant contracts had, at short notice, withdrawn their offers to fulfil them. Given the emerging situation, SPT officers met with NLC and SLC initially on Monday 15 August to inform them of this, followed up by detailed emails on Tuesday 16 August. SPT fully acknowledges the late communication of this in the emerging situation and subsequently issued a public apology, recognising the disruption that this causes for many, with a commitment to continue to seek to the address the issue as soon as possible. In this context, it is necessary to highlight that each council determines elements of their own HST specification which operators are required to respond to. In the case of NLC, this includes additional operator requirements including mandatory six-monthly MOT’s and a maximum vehicle age limit of no more than 20 years old. These conditions were introduced by NLC following a serious school bus crash in 2017. Whilst these additional conditions are understandable, this represents a further challenge in securing both local contractors and those from further afield at short notice that is unique to North Lanarkshire. In seeking to address the issue quickly, SPT mobilised a business recovery team focused on securing emergency coverage of HST in North & South Lanarkshire, working in partnership with the respective councils. The team were initially tasked with contacting operators of all sizes across Strathclyde, the rest of Scotland, north of England and Northern Ireland to ascertain if they could assist in the supply of buses, coaches, minibuses and taxis, inclusive of suitably qualified drivers. While some additional resources were identified and secured, it became apparent that given the scale of the driver shortage, particularly PCV qualified bus drivers, that the commercial market alone were unlikely to be able to meet the outstanding mainstream HST requirements in North & South Lanarkshire, at least not in the short term. Given the above, and following further discussions with the respective councils, it was agreed as an emergency measure that council internal fleets and qualified drivers would be deployed to cover any unfulfilled contracts on a temporary basis as the team continued to secure commercial cover. During this period a small number of instances of operators accepting and then not fulfilling contracts also occurred, making communication of information to parents particularly challenging. Due to the scale of the issue in North Lanarkshire specifically, SPT entered into discussion with a local coach operator about the opportunity to access a fleet of large coaches, although they were unable to provide additional drivers. This resulted in SPT, with council agreement, procuring the lease of 10 high capacity coaches from Parks of Hamilton to supplement the council’s internal minibus fleet. Suitably qualified bus drivers were identified within NLC and a small number in SPT to facilitate operations. To maximise the effectiveness of this resource, SPT also undertook the complex task of planning a “double run” scenario to ensure as many children had access to transport as possible. Through the efforts of staff at SPT, NLC, SLC and bus operators, an interim solution covering the vast majority of affected pupils was secured by Monday 22 August. This interim solution will provide SPT and council officers with suitable time to identify a longer- term solution over coming weeks. SPT officers continue to engage with NLC, SLC and operators on a daily basis in continuing to monitor the situation closely, and stand ready
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Operations 26 August 2022 - Mainstream Home to School Transport - Update Page 4 of 5 to address any further issues identified. SPT officers have been in regular contact with Scottish Government officials from both Transport Scotland and the Education Directorate to update on progress. Since the commencement of the above interim solution on Monday 22 August, SPT has managed to secure 49 contracts with commercial operators totalling 38 contracts in North Lanarkshire and 11 in South Lanarkshire. SPT officers continue to work closely with our partners in North and South Lanarkshire to secure further cover in this regard, where possible. In addition to the above, to address concerns and assist in communicating the interim solution to those affected, a dedicated helpline was setup by SPT specifically for Lanarkshire parents and guardians. The helpline commenced operation on Friday 19 August at 07:30hrs, staffed by the SPT Schools team, and remains in operation at the time of writing. More than 600 calls were received over the first six days of operation. 4. Conclusions Mainstream Home to School transport provision is essential in supporting and facilitating the education of children across Strathclyde. SPT has successfully managed, monitored and maintained provision of mainstream Home to School Transport on behalf of 11 of our partner councils for many years. However, it is clear that the normal challenges SPT faces in terms of securing HST have been exacerbated to an extent by the Covid 19 pandemic, market fragility, recent fuel price rises and the ongoing acute shortage of bus drivers being witnessed across the country. Despite this backdrop, it is factual that SPT secured transport for more than 95% of pupils across the 11 council areas ahead of the 2022/23 school term commencing. However, notwithstanding the above, SPT also recognises that it was wholly unacceptable for our partners in North and South Lanarkshire to be informed of the inability to meet their requirements at such short order ahead of the new school year commencing, due primarily to operators withdrawing their contract offers due to the reasons noted above. SPT was therefore quick to apologise to those pupils, parents & guardians affected, and took immediate steps to address the problem swiftly and efficiently within a very uncertain environment. Looking ahead, a comprehensive internal review has been initialised to identify lessons learned from the issue, including links with NLC and SLC, as we continue to work with the 11 councils to identify sustainable HST solutions moving forward. In addition, in discussion with the Chief Executive of NLC it has been agreed to order a joint review into how we ensure longer term stability of this service provision. It is intended that this will be completed before the end of the calendar year. 5. Conclusions The Committee is recommended to note this report. 6. Consequences Policy consequences Delivery of school transport is in line with the RTS. Legal consequences None directly. Financial consequences The overall school budget for 2022/23 across all Councils is £35.055m which represents an increase of £2.722m (8%) compared to the 2021/22 budget. The
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Operations 26 August 2022 - Mainstream Home to School Transport - Update Page 5 of 5 2022/23 projected outturn for each Council will confirmed on the finalisation of all contract awards. Personnel consequences To continue to deliver effective services staff from within the wider Bus Strategy & Delivery functions may need to undertake additional duties to assist the Schools Agency Services function. This will be continually reviewed and monitored Equalities consequences Ongoing monitoring of equalities impacts of school transport. Risk consequences Climate Change, Adaptation & Carbon consequences The fragility of the Home to School Transport market remains an ongoing risk to delivering services effectively and efficiently. School transport has a positive benefit through reducing the need for journeys by less sustainable modes. Name Neil Wylie Name Valerie Davidson Title Director of Finance & Corporate Support Title Chief Executive For further information, please contact Gordon Dickson, Head of Bus Strategy and Delivery at 0141 333 3407 or Bruce Kiloh, Head of Policy and Planning on 0141 333 3740.