Wokingham council in bus pass dispute involving Asperger's child

Wokingham Borough Council (WBC) was asked by a father of three to provide transport for his youngest son as he believed the route from home was unsafe.

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Both of his older sons already had home-to-school transport provided for them, including one son who had Asperger’s syndrome.

But WBC refused the application for the youngest son after bosses said the family did not live far away enough for the authority to provide free transport.

This led to the council also deciding to take away free transport for the elder children, one of which has Asperger’s, because measurement data from 2009 was judged to be “inaccurate”.

The children’s father contacted the Local Government Ombudsman (LGO), an authorities watchdog, to complain about the way WBC had made its decision after an appeal against the verdict did not change council chiefs’ minds.

This came after he was denied a second-stage appeal by WBC -- a policy the watchdog labelled “flawed” and “restrictive”.

LGO inspectors found WBC did not consider the safety of the youngest child when walking to school at the appeal panel.

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They also suggested it was unclear if bosses had considered one child’s Asperger’s when deciding to remove his free transport -- but WBC says a second child has now been offered transport.

A report from the watchdog read: “The council’s failure to consider the safety of the route has caused [the father] an injustice, as he cannot be confident the appeals panel took the correct information into consideration when reviewing his case.”

The LGO suggests WBC’s decision-making process was wrong and recommended it should consider the appeal for the youngest son at stage two and it should reconsider its decision to remove the other son's transport to ensure it considered his Asperger's.

Following this, the council’s road experts have checked the family’s path to school and deemed it to be a safe route.

A WBC spokesperson said: “Since the Ombudsman’s decision, the council now automatically offers a second appeal if the stage one appeal is unsuccessful.

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“In this case, the family concerned was offered a stage two appeal for one child and transport was offered for the second.

“The council ensures that transport policies are applied fairly and where free transport cannot be provided because a child lives within walking distance of their school, they have a safe walking route to follow.”