Summary: We found fault with the Council limiting provision of transport to post-16 children based on whether a pre-existing route exists and has capacity, rather than considering the needs of the applicant. We also found fault with the Council not considering affordability when awarding Personal Travel Payments. The Council agreed to update its policy, review its procedures and provide training to staff. The Council also agreed to apologise to Mrs X, provide a symbolic financial payment for the injustice its fault caused and reconsider its travel assistance decision for Mrs X’s child.

The complaint

1. Mrs X complained the Council awarded a Personal Travel Payment for her child’s transport to post-16 education rather than arranging transport. Mrs X says this is unsuitable for her child and does not cover the cost of arranging transport.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

2. We investigate complaints about ‘maladministration’ and ‘service failure’. In this statement, I have used the word fault to refer to these. We must also consider whether any fault has had an adverse impact on the person making the complaint. I refer to this as ‘injustice’. If there has been fault which has caused significant injustice, or that could cause injustice to others in the future we may suggest a remedy. (Local Government Act 1974, sections 26(1) and 26A(1), as amended)
3. We cannot question whether a decision is right or wrong simply because the complainant disagrees with it. We must consider if there was fault in the way the decision was reached. If we find fault, which calls into question the panel’s decision, we may ask for a new appeal hearing. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
4. An organisation should not adopt a blanket or uniform approach or policy that prevents it from considering the circumstances of a particular case. We may find fault in the actions of organisations that ‘fetter their discretion’ in this way.
5. We may investigate matters coming to our attention during an investigation if we consider that a member of the public who has not complained may have suffered an injustice as a result. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26D and 34E, as amended)
6. Under our information sharing agreement, we will share this decision with the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted).
7. If we are satisfied with an organisation’s actions or proposed actions, we can complete our investigation and issue a decision statement. (Local Government Act 1974, section 30(1B) and 34H(1), as amended)

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How I considered this complaint

8. I considered evidence provided by Mrs X and the Council as well as relevant law, policy and guidance.
9. Mrs X and the Council had an opportunity to comment on my draft decision. I considered any comments before making a final decision.

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What I found

Rules and regulations

10. For learners of sixth form age, the Council has a duty to prepare and publish a transport policy statement specifying the arrangements for transport, or otherwise, it considers necessary to facilitate attendance at education or training as set out in s.509AA Education Act 1996 (‘The Act’). S.509AB requires the statement to explicitly set out the arrangements for students with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).
11. The Government has issued statutory guidance ‘Post-16 transport and travel support to education and training’, 2019 (‘The Guidance’). This says the statutory responsibility for transport rests with councils and the intention of the transport duty is to ensure learners can access education or training of their choice and, if support for access is requested, this will be assessed and provided where necessary.
12. The Guidance says councils must exercise their power to provide transport or financial support ‘reasonably, taking into account all relevant matters’.
13. If a council decides it is ‘necessary’ to provide support to facilitate attendance, they have broad discretion on the type of transport assistance to offer. There is no duty to make a vehicle available, even for a pupil with an EHC Plan or SEND; councils can make alternative arrangements including providing PTBs.(R (on the application of Drexler) v Leicestershire County Council [2020] EWCA Civ 502)
14. The Guidance says councils may ask sixth form learners and their parents for a contribution to transport costs and in exercising this discretion they should ensure any contribution is affordable.
15. The Guidance says councils must publish a complaint or appeal process as part of its transport policy. It is for councils to determine how their appeals process will operate but the Guidance says good practice is to use a similar two-stage process to that for under 16s, for which a recommended process is set out in statutory guidance ‘Travel to school for children of compulsory school age’. This recommends an independent review panel considers complaints at stage two. Appeal decisions should set out the factors considered and why a decision was reached.
16. The Act (s.509AA(8)) says councils may make arrangements which are not specified in the policy statement which they consider necessary.

Council Policy

17. The Council changed its transport policy statement for post-16 education for the academic year 2025/2026.
18. The Council’s policy says it would only consider support for learners aged 16-25:
• With learning difficulties and/or disabilities and are studying on a full-time basis.
• If they have an Education, Health and Care Plan and are attending the school/college named within their Plan, which is the nearest appropriate school/college and is over the 3-mile statutory walking distance.
19. The Council’s policy says it will refuse any request for travel assistance if the provision named is not the nearest provision.
20. The Council’s policy outlines it will offer Independent Travel Training or Personal Travel Payments to help support a person to attend education.
21. The Council’s policy says in exceptional circumstances it will consider provision of council-organised travel assistance. This can be a mini-bus in areas where lots of students access their local college and the learner may have profound and significant difficulties.
22. The Council’s Personal Travel Payment information booklet outlines that getting children to college is ultimately a parent or carers responsibility and a Personal Travel Payment is a form of assistance. The Council’s approach to calculating Personal Travel Payments is based purely on the distance a student travels from their home address to their educational placement. The Council’s information booklet allows for no deviation from this approach.

What happened

23. Mrs X had a child, Y, who was post-16 education age, but below 19 years old, in the academic year 2025/2026.
24. In June 2025, Mrs X applied for post-16 travel assistance. Mrs X told the Council Y cannot use public transport, unless accompanied by an adult, because of safety concerns.
25. In July 2025, the Council declined Mrs X’s application because Y was not attending the nearest college to their home address. The Council signposted Mrs X to its appeal process.
26. Mrs X appealed the Council’s decision and said the college was the only placement that could meet Y’s needs and was named in Y’s Education, Health and Care Plan. Mrs X reiterated that Y cannot use public transport.
27. The Council provided a stage one review response and advised it could provide travel assistance to Y because of the new information provided. The Council advised it could offer Personal Travel Payments for Y or Independent Travel Training but it does “not have other travel options in place that” Y can access.
28. In August 2025, Mrs X asked the Council for the reasoning behind the monetary amount provided through the Personal Travel Payment. Mrs X said this only covered about 10% of the cost of transporting Y to school rather than arranging transport. The Council responded to Mrs X to advise “the post 16 policy has changed from this September and a PTP [Personal Travel Payments] or travel training is the only option for students”.
29. Mrs X sought a stage two review from the Council and said that Personal Travel Payments are not suitable for Y. Mrs X said she has accepted Personal Travel Payments as a temporary measure to help Y access college but it will not work in the long term.
30. The Council provided its stage two review response and said:
• It had correctly applied its policy and award of Personal Travel Payments discharges its discretionary duty.
• Personal Travel Payments are not intended to cover the full cost of transport and are simply a contribution.
• It had looked to see if there are any shared routes with vacant seats which could be re-routed to collect Y but nothing is available.
31. In response to the Ombudsman’s enquiries, the Council told the Ombudsman it limits its discretionary powers to offer transport for post-16 students to situations where a suitable existing route operates from, or passes through, the student’s home community to the educational setting.

Analysis

32. The law sets out a statutory duty for councils to prepare and publish a transport policy statement outlining transport arrangements it considers necessary to facilitate attendance at education for children post-16 in age. The Council must consider the needs of students who could not reasonably attend an educational placement to receive education if no arrangements were made.
33. In R (S) v Education (Waltham Forest) and the London Borough of Waltham Forest [2006] EWHC 3144 the Court said decisions about the type of transport support required a ‘careful and sensitive assessment, based so far as possible on reliable information or evidence’. The Court identified relevant factors to assist councils:
• The effect of having to drive on the young person or the parent.
• The effect on the young person and their wellbeing.
• Cost.
• Whether shared transport is impractical.
34. The Court noted these factors were ‘not necessarily exhaustive’ and it will be for councils ‘to consider any matter which is put before them or which they consider relevant in making the assessment required’. The Court recognised the need for exceptions and that for some students the only appropriate provision would be expensive.
35. The Council has discretion about how to provide post-16 transport but must do so as is “necessary” to enable a learner’s attendance at education. The Council can utilise Independent Travel Training and Personal Travel Payments, as the primary focus of travel assistance. However, the Council must consider the individual needs of an applicant when making any decision about the appropriate travel assistance to provide.
36. The Council’s 2025/2026 policy wording outlines it will arrange transport in exceptional circumstances. This gives the Council a mechanism to consider individual need. However, the Council’s policy says it will only provide transport where lots of students access their local college. The Council confirmed to the Ombudsman it would only offer transport if a pre-existing route was already in operation and it had capacity.
37. The Council’s confirmed reading of its policy so that it only offers transport if a pre-existing route was already in operation prevents the Council from considering the needs of the applicant if a pre-existing route does not exist. This is fettering its discretion and is fault.

Impact on Y

38. The Council did not consider whether Y could make the journey to their educational placement without the provision of transport. The Council has not considered Y’s needs in any of its responses to Mrs X and has shown no consideration of needs in any case documents or notes. In fact, the Council has no evidence of any contemporaneous notes detailing its decision making outside of the correspondence sent to Mrs X. This is despite Y’s Education, Health and Care Plan confirming that Y had “little road safety awareness”. This was fault.
39. Instead, the Council focused on not providing transport because of a lack of available pre-existing routes and because of its erroneous position that it did not provide transport for post-16 education because of a change in its policy. This was again fault.
40. Because the process the Council followed was flawed, we can question its decision. We cannot say what decision the Council would have made, in respect of transport to the College for Y, if it had properly considered the law. The council should retake its decision applying a needs-based approach and, if provision of travel is refused, offer new appeal rights. Should the Council decide it should have provided transport to Y it should reimburse Mrs X accordingly for her expenses in the 2025/2026 academic year caused by the Council’s previous decision.

Personal Travel Payments

41. The Council’s approach to Personal Travel Payments outlines that any payment it makes is a discretionary contribution towards costs. The Council is correct to say a Personal Travel Payment does not need to cover the full cost of transport. But, the Council must consider whether any contribution is affordable.
42. In some cases, the only option may be to provide a more expensive alternative to a Personal Travel Payments, because, in the circumstances, a Personal Travel Payment will not facilitate attendance at education. Or, that the Council would need to diverge from its standard approach of how it calculates Personal Travel Payments, based on distance alone, to award a higher Personal Travel Payment to ensure a person has access to education. What is affordable is an issue for consideration on the individual facts of each case and should be recorded. A blanket approach to calculating Personal Travel Payments without consideration of affordability is fault.
43. The Council has shown no evidence it considered affordability when it decided to award a Personal Travel Payment for Y. This was fault and presented potential barriers to Y accessing suitable education.

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Action

44. Within one month of the Ombudsman’s final decision the Council will:
• Provide an apology to Mrs X and a symbolic payment of £250 to acknowledge her avoidable frustration and the avoidable time and trouble caused to her by the Council’s failings with Y’s home to college transport and appeals process identified in this decision. We publish guidance on remedies which sets out our expectations for how organisations should apologise effectively to remedy injustice. The organisation should consider this guidance in making the apologies we have recommended in our findings.
• Reconsider Mrs X’s transport application considering Y’s needs. If the Council concludes it was necessary for Y to receive transport, then it should confirm in writing it will reimburse Mrs X for any expenses she incurred arranging transport for Y for the academic year 2025/2026, deducting any Personal Travel payments made to Mrs X and any costs Mrs X would needed to have paid the Council in line with its policy for provision of this transport.
45. Within two months of the Ombudsman’s final decision the Council will:
• Review its post-16 Travel Policy Statement to ensure there is no restriction applied to consideration of provision of transport based only if a pre-existing route is in operation and remind staff of this.
• Ensure all decision makers are aware of the need to consider the individual circumstances of each case, of the Council’s residual duty in cases of ‘real need’ and that officers know they can depart from the published policy if necessary to facilitate attendance in a particular case. We suggest the factors in R (S) v Education (Waltham Forest) [2006] EWHC 3144 provide a useful guide to assist decision makers.
• Ensure decision makers make brief notes to show how they have considered the individual circumstances, including the needs of the applicant, cost and affordability.
46. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Decision

47. There was fault leading to injustice. As the Council has agreed to my recommendations, I have completed my investigation.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman