Summary: There was fault in the way the Council communicated its home to school transport policy for September 2025 school admissions. There was also fault in how it considered Mrs X’s appeal for home to school transport. These faults have caused Mrs X frustration and uncertainty that her appeal was decided correctly. The Council has agreed to apologise to Mrs X and offer her a fresh stage two appeal hearing.

The complaint

1. Mrs X complained about the Council’s decision not to provide her child Y with free transport to their catchment secondary school, school A, following a change in the Council’s home to school transport policy. Mrs X complained the Council and later the transport appeal committee failed to:
• communicate the policy change properly;
• accept the route to school A that the Council used in its measurements was unavailable; and
• use the nearest entrance to school A to measure the home to school distance.
2. In addition, Mrs X complained the coordinates used by the Council to measure the home to school distance were wrong and it was not measured in line with the policy. This has caused her frustration and uncertainty over whether Y should be awarded free home to school transport. She would like the Council to recalculate the route to establish which is the nearest school.

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The Ombudsman’s role and powers

3. 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)
4. We consider whether there was fault in the way an organisation made its decision. If there was no fault in how the organisation made its decision, we cannot question the outcome. (Local Government Act 1974, section 34(3), as amended)
5. When considering complaints we make findings based on the balance of probabilities. This means that we look at the available relevant evidence and decide what was more likely to have happened.
6. 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

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

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What I found

Relevant law and guidance

9. Local authorities must make suitable home to school travel arrangements as they consider necessary for ‘eligible children’ of compulsory school age to attend their ‘qualifying school’. The travel arrangements must be made and provided free of charge. The relevant qualifying school is the nearest school with places available that provides education appropriate to the age, ability and aptitude of the child, and any special educational needs the child may have. ‘Eligible children’ includes children living outside ‘statutory walking distance’ from the school (two miles for children under eight, three miles for children aged eight and above).
10. Councils should have an appeals process in place for parents who wish to appeal about the eligibility of their child for travel support.
11. The statutory guidance recommends councils adopt the following appeals process:

• Stage 1: review by a senior officer. Within 20 working days of receiving a parent’s written request to appeal the decision, a senior officer reviews the original decision and sends the parent a detailed written notification of the outcome of the review setting out the nature of the decision, how the review was conducted, what was taken into account, the rationale for the decision reached, and how to escalate their case to stage 2; and
• Stage 2: review by independent appeal panel. Within 40 working days of receipt of the parent’s request to escalate to stage 2, an independent appeal panel considers written and verbal representations. Within five working days following this, a detailed decision is sent setting out: the nature of the decision reached; how the review was conducted; what factors were considered; the rationale for the decision reached; and information about appealing to us. (Department of Education, Travel to school for children of compulsory school age statutory guidance 2023, Part 5)

12. The statutory code of guidance sets out that:
• The statutory walking distances are used to determine whether a child is eligible for free travel to school. This is not necessarily the shortest distance by road. The route may include footpaths, bridleways, other pathways and alternative entrances to the school.
• Where the schools are beyond walking distance, councils may consider it more appropriate to measure the shortest road route or the straight line distance. It should be made clear in the council’s school travel policy how the route will be measured.
• It should be clear to parents how they can find out which is their nearest school for admissions purposes and which is the nearest for school free transport purposes.
• Councils must publish their travel policy on their website and include information about their school travel policy in their composite prospectus for school admissions.
13. The guidance says an effective school travel policy will:
• Be easy for parents to find on the council’s website;
• Be clearly written so that parents may easily understand it;
• Enable parents to understand the circumstances in which a child is eligible for free travel to school;
• Tell parents how and when they should apply for free travel to school; and
• Tell parents how they may appeal against the council’s decision in relation to travel to school for their child.

The Council’s home to school travel policy

14. The Council operates catchment areas for admission to some of the schools in its area. This means those living in a certain geographical area get priority if a school is oversubscribed. Until 2024 the Council provided school transport to the catchment area school for those living over three miles away.
15. In September 2024 the Council implemented a new Home To School Travel Policy. Under the new policy the Council only provides free transport to new applicants attending the nearest qualifying school to home. This meant certain towns and villages no longer qualified for transport to a catchment school and the nearest qualifying school may be in another council’s area.
16. The policy explained the nearest suitable school for school travel purposes may not be the catchment school used for admissions purposes. It said:
• ‘When deciding on eligibility for assistance with transport, the measurement from home to school will be taken from the fixed point within the property to the nearest entrance point (not always the main entrance) to the school following the nearest available walked route, as defined by the Council’s Geographical Information System (GIS)’.
• ‘The distance is not the shortest distance by road and the route may include footpaths, public rights of way, bridleways and other pathways identified on the GIS’.
• ‘Parents have the right to preference any school of their choice when applying for a school place, they do not however have a right to free-of-charge travel arrangements to that school. Travel eligibility will be assessed in line with the eligibility criteria in this policy. If the nearest school is undersubscribed with places available, then it will be the nearest suitable school for travel purposes, and free travel would not be provided to an alternative school that is further away’.
• ‘If the nearest school is fully subscribed without places available, then the Council will need to assess if the child could have secured a place had one been applied for. This will be done by comparing the child with the last child to be offered a place at the school and determining which of them would have higher priority. This will often be a straightforward matter of determining which child lives closest to the school’.
17. The Council operates a two stage appeal procedure: a stage one review by a senior officer and a stage two appeal heard by the Council’s school transport appeals committee (a small group of elected councillors). The policy states that the committee considers the policy guidelines but may recommend departure from those guidelines in exceptional cases.

Publication of the new home to school transport policy

18. The Council carried out consultation regarding the new policy in early 2024 including webinars and face to face events in March 2024. The Council agreed the policy at its executive meeting in July 2024.
19. In early September 2024, the Council sent an email to schools with a request that it be forwarded to parents of those due to start secondary school in September 2025 about the secondary school admission process. The email included one line which said ‘there have been some changes in eligibility to home to school transport, so if this is an important factor when choosing a school please go to: [weblink]. Here you can use the online tool to find your nearest school to your home address’.
20. The link went to the Council’s School Transport page which contained two separate links to the policy, one of which linked to the 2019 policy instead of the new policy. The Council corrected this error in March 2025. The Council’s school transport page also included a distance calculator which would list the nearest schools to home.
21. In September 2024 the Council also sent schools via its weekly email under the ‘information, updates and guidance’ section ‘a request that the information attached is made available to parents as part of secondary open evenings’. The attached information was a slide presentation which set out that the revised home to school travel policy was being implemented and ‘the main eligibility criteria for eligible pupils is for travel to their nearest suitable school with places available’.
22. The Council’s website for starting secondary school included a link to the September 2024 home to school transport policy. A line on the website page said, ‘we provide free school transport to the nearest school to your home if it is over the required walking distance’.
23. The application disclaimer also said, ‘Please note if you apply for and are allocated a school which is not your nearest suitable school with places available you will be responsible for getting your child to school’.

The Council’s scrutiny committee

24. The Council’s Children and Families Overview and Scrutiny Committee met in February 2026 to discuss the home to school transport policy. Members of the public pre-submitted questions. At the meeting parents raised a concern about the maps the Council had produced for the school transport appeals. They said the coordinates used by the GIS mapping system related to points inside the school grounds and inside the family’s home rather than at a school gate or boundary of the home, calling into question the measured distances.
25. The Council said these coordinates were the unique reference points for the properties used by the system to find addresses. However, the coordinates used for the distance calculations measured from the property address to the nearest school entrance and the maps shared with parents showed the correct distances. The Council said it was collating information to provide a comprehensive response to all enquiries about its mapping system as part of the post implementation review of the policy.
26. The committee resolved to engage in the post implementation review process and to take no further action on the issues raised.

What happened

27. In the normal admissions round Mrs X successfully applied for her child to attend the local catchment area school, school A, from September 2025. In May 2025 she received a letter advising her that Y did not qualify for free home to school transport as school A was not the nearest suitable school.
28. In early July Mrs X appealed against the Council’s decision to refuse Y transport. She explained she was a single parent who worked mornings and could not transport Y to school. When they applied to school A they were not aware of the small difference in distance between the catchment and nearest school. Y’s peers were all attending school A which was also able to meet Y’s special educational needs.
29. Mrs X contacted the Council shortly afterwards to request a copy of the maps used to calculate the distances. She informed the Council the route it used crossed a private estate which had no public right of way. Mrs X also provided the Council with a map with a nearer school entrance marked.
30. The Council responded later that month. It said it noted she had highlighted a new school entrance, but this was not recognised on its mapping system, and school staff had not advised the Council of it. Until it had investigated this further the new entrance could not be incorporated onto the mapping system. It said it would investigate the inaccessible route and asked Mrs X to identify the route which could not be accessed by the public which she did.
31. The Council responded at stage one of its appeal procedure the following day. It did not uphold the appeal. It said it had made the decision in line with the policy and school A was parental preference. School A was 5.752 miles from home, and the nearest school was 5.692 miles from home. It noted Y had SEN support but not an Education, Health and Care (EHC) Plan naming a specific school.
32. Mrs X submitted a stage two appeal. She explained she was unaware of the policy change until she received the letter refusing transport. She had received no information about the change. She said the Council had disregarded Y’s SEN support statement and the resources put in place by School A to support Y. She provided information from the landowner who reported much of the route was impassable and contained inaccessible areas. Given the difference in distance between the two routes Mrs X felt it was important the council measured the distances properly.
33. The Council held Mrs X’s stage two appeal in late August 2025. The Council’s report to the appeal committee stated school A was not the nearest school and the choice of school was parental preference. It said consultation on the policy was widely advertised. If Mrs X had applied for the nearest school Y would have received a place. A representative attended the appeal on behalf of Mrs X as a reasonable adjustment for her disability.
34. The notes of the appeal committee record the Council presented its case. It said information on the new policy was sent to parents via primary and secondary schools. It acknowledged Y’s SEN but said without an EHC Plan all mainstream schools are expected to meet Y’s needs. It said the routes used were those available on its mapping system and where there is no requirement to assess safety ‘we do not consider issues such as the actual availability of the route in terms of private land’.
35. In response to questions the Council said it would only assess the route if the child was expected to walk. Mrs X’s representative also referred to the other school gate not included in the mapping system. The Council said it had not considered this.
36. Mrs X’s representative also asked about communication of the new policy and its accessibility for those parents with a disability. The Council responded that there was a section on the website for help for those who could not fill out the form.
37. The appeal committee asked how the Council could use a route that was not a right of way. The Council’s representative said it is what is available on its system. Maps are updated annually and use routes it believes are available.
38. Mrs X’s representative presented her case. They explained the difference in distance was small and the gate at school A which had been used for seven years was not on the Council maps. The representative considered this would make school A the closest school. They said the route the Council had calculated to school A was not accessible and the Council should take this into account. They said there was a lack of clarity regarding the new policy.
39. The appeal committee decided the Council had applied the policy correctly and there were no exceptional circumstances. It did not uphold the appeal. In their deliberations one member stated they had concerns about how the walking route to school A was calculated and could not see how it could be included in the calculations but did not uphold the appeal.
40. In her complaint to us Mrs X also raised concerns about the accuracy of the distances on the maps she was provided with. She said the coordinates on the maps did not equate to an entrance but to the centre of the buildings and this called into question whether the catchment school, school A, was actually the nearest.

Findings

41. We expect councils to explain their policies clearly to enable parents to make informed decisions when applying for schools about whether their child might be eligible for school transport. The evidence shows the Council consulted widely on the new policy but there was fault in the way it was communicated. The Council’s website wrongly linked to the old policy which was fault.
42. The Council’s new policy is a significant change from its previous one. In particular, free transport is no longer automatically provided to catchment area schools over three miles away. The Council’s website referred to transport being provided to the nearest suitable school, but we would not expect parents to be experts in the subtlety of language used in Government guidance and what is meant by suitable school. A parent may wrongly assume the catchment school is the nearest suitable school. It is only within the transport policy itself that the Council states ‘the nearest qualifying school for school travel purposes may not be the catchment school used for admissions purposes’. The Council did not clearly spell out on its website or admissions form that transport would not automatically be provided to the catchment school if it was over three miles away.
43. Although the Council circulated information to all schools, this was in the ‘information, updates and guidance’ section and not in the ‘for action’ section of the email. It asked secondary schools to make parents aware there were policy changes but did not ask primary schools to highlight the changes to year 6 parents who would be applying for secondary school. The attached presentation slides emphasised free transport would be provided to the nearest suitable school but as set out above did not clearly set out that this was not necessarily the catchment school.
44. This poor communication is fault and meant Mrs X could not make a fully informed decision about which secondary school to apply for. The appeal committee went on to consider her appeal for school transport.

Mrs X’s appeal

45. The Ombudsman is not an appeal body. This means we do not take a second look at a council’s decision to decide if it was wrong. Instead, we look at the processes it followed to make its decision. If we consider it followed those processes correctly, the law says we cannot question whether the decision was right or wrong, regardless of whether someone disagrees with the decision it made.
46. At the stage two appeal hearing, in its deliberations the committee made no comment on the points Mrs X’s representative raised about the lack of communication of the new policy. There is no evidence the committee properly considered the impact on Mrs X of how the new policy was communicated and how that might have influenced her choice of schools. This was fault which leaves Mrs X with uncertainty over what decision the committee would have reached had it properly considered the information she provided about communication of the new policy.
47. Mrs X’s representative also raised concerns about the availability of the route used to measure the distances and that parts of its crossed private land. The Council’s policy refers to the nearest available walked route. Although the Council does not have to consider the safety of the route when the distance from home to school is over three miles, crossing private land is not an available route in line with its policy. The committee failed to properly consider this and the impact this may have had on the distances measured between school A and the other nearer school. This was fault and calls into question whether the appeal committee properly considered Mrs X’s appeal.
48. The notes also show no evidence of how the appeal committee considered the information Mrs X provided about an additional and nearer entrance to school A. Although the Council decided that the distances used were based on the maps available on national offer day, it was open to the appeal committee to consider this information and reach its own decision or to ask the Council for further clarification. It should have taken account of the Council’s policy which says the route is ‘to the nearest entrance point (not always the main entrance) to the school’.
49. It is for the appeal committee to decide what, if any, impact these faults may have had on Mrs X’s original school admission application and subsequent school transport application. We need to see evidence in the notes taken of the appeal that the issues were properly considered.

Mapping issues

50. Mrs X has since raised with us her concerns about the coordinates used in the mapping system. Given the small difference of 0.06 miles between the distance to the nearest and catchment school, if there is fault, this could affect which school is the nearest. The issues with the accuracy of the maps provided to parents were also considered at the Council’s Scrutiny Committee. However, it did not reach a view on whether it was satisfied with the Council’s explanation of how the distances were calculated. The Scrutiny Committee was given an explanation by Council officers but no evidence to support the Council’s assertion that although the maps showed coordinates inside the school, the measurement itself was to another point - the school’s nearest entrance. Mrs X’s concerns are new information that has not been considered by the appeal committee. It is open to Mrs X to present this information as part of the new stage two appeal that I have recommended.
51. The Council has confirmed that there is a county wide project being undertaken, gathering information to update the mapping system for the 2027 admission round opening in September 2026. I am satisfied this is an appropriate way to address any concerns about the accuracy of the maps used for future appeals and so have not made any service improvement recommendations on this issue.

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Agreed action

52. Within two months of the final decision being issued, the Council has agreed to:
1. apologise to Mrs X for the frustration and uncertainty caused by the Council’s faults. 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 apology.
2. arrange a new second-stage appeal committee to consider Mrs X’s appeal again. The panel should comprise of new members. In particular it should ensure it considers
1. the way the Council communicated the new policy and the impact this may have had on Mrs X;
2. the availability of the route when measuring distances, and
3. the issues she has since raised regarding the mapping information used to measure the distances in Mrs X’s case.
53. The Council should provide us with evidence it has complied with the above actions.

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Decision

54. I find fault causing injustice which the Council has agreed to remedy.

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Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman