Summary: We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint about the Council’s decision to refuse his request for free home to school transport. This is because there is not enough evidence of fault by the Council for us to be able to question its decision.

The complaint

1. The complainant, whom I shall refer to as Mr X, complained the Council has refused to provide his child with free transport to secondary school. Mr X says information on the Council’s website is misleading and other children living nearby seem to receive free transport. Mr X says the Council has not properly considered his case.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’, which we call ‘fault’. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint, which we call ‘injustice’. We provide a free service, but must use public money carefully. We do not start or continue an investigation if we decide there is not enough evidence of fault to justify investigating. (Local Government Act 1974, section 24A(6), as amended, section 34(B))

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How I considered this complaint

3. I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
4. I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.

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My assessment

5. Councils have a duty to provide free school transport to ‘eligible’ children. These include children attending the nearest suitable school to home and who live over the statutory walking distance; for children of secondary school age this is three miles. Statutory guidance on home to school transport states the nearest secondary school to a student’s home will almost always be their nearest suitable school.
6. In this case, Mr X has asked the Council to provide his child with free transport to secondary school. The Council has refused because it says the school Mr X’s child attends is not the nearest suitable school. This means there is no entitlement to free transport. The Council has considered Mr X’s case through its appeals process and decided not to uphold his appeal.
7. While I understand Mr X’s frustrations, we will not start an investigation.
8. The Ombudsman is not an appeal body. This means we do not take a second look at a decision to decide if it was wrong. Instead, we look at the processes an organisation followed to make its decision. If we consider it followed those processes correctly, we cannot question whether the decision was right or wrong, regardless of whether a complainant disagrees with the decision the organisation made.
9. Mr X says that using his measurements the school his child attends is the closest to his home. But that is not what the Council’s own measurements indicate. The Council’s policy says it will use its own system to calculate the closest school. We could not therefore say the Council was at fault for refusing Mr X’s original application. It was a decision consistent with the law and the Council’s own policy. The fact other children might receive transport to the same school does not mean the Council has acted with fault when rejecting Mr X’s application.
10. Mr X also states the Council has failed to consider the reasons he selected the school his child attends. These include their medical needs and aptitude for the performing arts. Mr X says his child had to audition for a place at the school they attend. Councils should have an appeals process for parents to challenge decisions about their child’s eligibility for free transport. The Council has considered Mr X’s appeals and decided not to provide transport. This is a decision the Council is entitled to take. I note the Council’s policy contains a provision for where the closest school is a grammar school. Those schools which select by aptitude, rather than ability, are treated like any other. There is not enough evidence of fault here for us to question the Council’s decision.
11. Mr X has also questioned the information on the Council’s website. Mr X says that when he inputs his home address it lists the school his child attends as the first catchment school. But I note the Council’s website states “The information provided through this tool is solely in relation to school admissions and does not relate to the provision of home to school transport... The priority admission (catchment) area school for an address may not be the nearest school to that address.” The link to home to school transport takes parents to a page which states “To find out your nearest primary or secondary school for the purposes of transport, please e-mail the Education Awards Team and give your child’s full name and address.” Full details of the Council’s home to school transport policy are available on its website and this clearly sets out the eligibility criteria the Council has applied to Mr X’s case. The information on the Council’s website is correct and does not show any fault in the consideration of Mr X’s request for transport.

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Final decision

12. We will not investigate Mr X’s complaint because there is not enough evidence of fault.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman