Agenda item

A copy of the consultation documents is attached to the agenda for the Commission’s consideration.

The Commission considered a consultation exercise in relation to proposed changes to transport for students at faith and voluntary aided schools and students aged 16+, home to school transport for students who change address during their final year of study and concessionary travel. A copy of the consultation documents, marked ‘Item 11’, is filed with these minutes.

Mr. L. Spence CC, having declared a personal interest that may lead to bias on the issue of school transport to faith and voluntary aided schools left the room during the discussion on this matter.

Arising from the debate, the following points were noted:

Home to School Transport

·                Clarification of the effect the Government’s academies programme would have on home to school transport was awaited. For this reason, transport to academies had been omitted from this stage of the consultation process and would be dealt with at a later date when the consultation options were available in relation to the transport to faith schools, for students aged 16+ and those who change schools in the final year of studies. The outcome of the current consultation exercise would be reported to the Commission at its next meeting;

Concessionary Travel

·                The basis for reimbursing operators who participated in the statutory Concessionary Travel scheme was an average fare for each route. “Smart Ticketing” would enable a greater understanding of how people were using services, however this would not impact on reimbursement rates, as these were embodied in the statutory scheme.  Smart Ticketing was available on all major operators’ buses in the County, though the communication of the data to back offices was not expected to be in place until 2014.

Consultation Methods

·                A number of general concerns were raised in relation to the way in which the County Council conducted consultation with its residents. These concerns were raised, not only within the context of the current consultation on transport, but also the Council’s requirement to identify an additional £20million of savings and the associated consultation that would need to be carried out in the near future.

These concerns were expressed as follows:

o    At present, the response rates for many County Council consultations were very low and it was questioned whether the results were sufficiently representative and therefore what weighting should be given to the response. It was important that local residents were aware that consultation did not mean a referendum. The text included in consultation exercises needed better to reflect the fact that people were being asked for their views and that these would inform rather than decide any outcome. It was also felt that this should be reflected in the feedback from consultation exercises that was passed on to respondents. The importance of meaningful consultation was stressed;

o    It was felt that consultation should not be handled merely as an online exercise, as a number of local residents did not have access to the internet. By excluding this group of people, the number of potential responses was unnecessarily being limited by default. Whilst it was noted that those without access to the internet could request a paper copy of a consultation survey, there remained concerns as to how those without internet access were expected to be aware that any consultation was taking place;

o    A clear case should be made for why demography information should be requested in surveys. It was felt this could be off-putting and add to the time commitment required to fill out a survey, hence possibly reducing response rates. The sentence stating that people did not have to include demography information should, in any case, be given more prominence.

RESOLVED:

(a)          That it be noted that the outcome of the consultation on transport to faith schools, for students aged 16+, students who changed schools in their final year and concessionary travel would be reported to the Commission’s meeting on 5 July;

(b)          That the concerns outlined above in relation to the way in which the Council conducts consultation exercises be brought to the attention of the Cabinet as part of its discussion on the proposed consultation on the Medium Term Financial Strategy, at its meeting on 12 June.