School children should receive free bus travel before pensioners?

[Itchthescratch]

My child is starting a school where it will cost around £2k for bus travel. This school is local and one of the closest schools to us. The other schools close to us are much worse in terms of opportunities and academic outcomes. I can afford the bus fare easily but I worry that some poorer families will really struggle to send their children to the higher achieving school because of the cost.

I understand that there isn't an endless pot of money but surely it would make sense to give school children free travel ahead of other groups like pensioners? School children are statistically much more likely to suffer from poverty (child poverty is almost double pensioner poverty)and it seems crazy that we aren't supporting social mobility whilst we let all pensioners travel for free on buses.

All of them?

There is not catchment for care homes. They DO get a higher budget based on what their care needs are….

Yes that's true too but if they worked all their lives they would have full state pension and not be able to claim pension credit either. But you are right as pension credit also includes carers, disabled people etc. either way do not fair to means test it.

No OAPS absolutely don’t choose dentists , doctors etc further away they prefer facilities closer. They move closer to facilities.Our local hospital OAPs are directed to has zero parking, none.

The home's fees must fit within the council’s personal budget calculation.

Right, great to have the voice of all pensioners on this thread. Interestingly none of the pensioners in my family go to their most local doctors or hospital. They do go to the local dentist. You must discipline them for not behaving how pensioners should.

As I said - ALL BENEFITS should be means tested. Every single one of them.

Hiewrver. I’m afraid you are wrong again - child benefit is based on household income. 80k is the cut off - 60k plus invokes reductions on a sliding scale.

Wrong again.

Agree - the rules for school transport have changed around here.

DS does a similar journey to school as I did in the 90s. According to Google maps, his journey is 4.2 miles and mine was 2.8 miles. Both grammar schools so not the nearest available school. I had a free bus pass from the Local Authority and DS doesn't. (Not complaining about DS - we knew the score when he went for the grammar school. But it is an extra cost that parents didn't used to have to cover.)

No not wrong. If you want to go somewhere that costs higher than the council have calculated through choice you pay a top up fee.

Given that I work in the very area you’re talking about (I do care and support assessments and put together packages of care), I’m confident that I’m correct.

Do people needing care within a care setting have a choice of which setting they choose? Yes
Is there flexibility in the budget according to their care needs? Yes. This is called the AGREED BUDGET. The INDICATIVE BUDGET is just that, indicative and often the final agreed budget is more

Do people who want to choose a care home (instead of the various care homes on offer - CHOICE) that is outside he agreed budget yes.

Can those who feel their care needs will not be met in the settings available under the AGREED budget? YES.

Are those challenges often successful? YES.

So yes. There are choices.

your claim that individuals needing care in a care setting have no choice in their care is incorrect.

So if you choose a care home that costs more than your personal budget you don’t have to pay a top up. NHS says otherwise :-

“If you choose a care home that's more expensive than your personal budget, a relative or friend can pay the difference (this is called a top up fee). They will have to sign an agreement with the council and care home which sets out the costs, how often they have to pay, and what will happen if they can no longer make the payment.“

A) it’s AGREED BUDGET, not personal budget.
B) Via the Care Act 2014, if you do not want to choose the care homes available (and there’s more than one to choose from) and you feel your care needs will not be met then you can challenge. Many challenges are successful.

Feel free to google all you like, but again, I actually work in this area.

They absoloutly DO have a choice - usually at least three different card homes initially with the option to ask for a wider exploration and more options (unlike with the school system where you can only choose three schools and may not end up in any of them due to over subscription and dnd up dumped in a school miles abc miles away and having to pay for the transport)

Wrong it’s based in individual income.

So you lose it completely it if one adult is on£80k but unbelievably 2 x £79 household (so £158 k household income )gets to keep it all.

www.gov.uk/child-benefit-tax-charge

I never said FSM I said access some form of benefit.
My point about parental involvement is that they won’t commit to travelling further afield, they can’t be bothered getting up and feeding their child and are always late for the school on their doorstep never mind getting to a school further away.
if all children are offered a place in a school further away but is good what happens when these schools fill up quickly. If the school is oversubscribed how do you decide who goes there obviously you can’t use catchment area. Do you just send them further and further away.
What about friendship groups, the further away from school they are the further away from their friends of an evening and weekend they are. Poorer families won’t have cars to get them there, even if free travel was offered for weekends and evening, they would be travelling home in the dark.
Again your view is too simplistic. The whole education system needs an overhaul, all children should be offered a good education within their community, with the chance to travel if wanted.
if all children are offered free travel that frees £2000 up for you. You can afford so why should you get it for free? Does you free travel include private schools, millionaires. Unfortunately life isn’t fair or equal.

Not talking about care needs but choice. If you choose somewhere else more expensive due to choice you pay top up fees. As laid out by the NHS I quoted.

You don’t have to pay for transport if the council allocates you a school further away provided it is your nearest suitable school with places available.

Why are you obsessed with parents? Who is the direct beneficiary of all of this, the child of the parent? You act as though children don't exist as their own entities until they turn 18. It's ridiculous!

It’s the parents that choose the school! Why shouldn’t they pay for their choice?

Only in some places. In the 90s I had to pay for my bus fare to school in London. I was just under 3 miles away from school so did walk sometimes.

I'm not being too simplistic, I'm being realistic. Of course it would be better if the whole system is overhauled but that isn't going to happen. In so many ways the inequality between schools and the advantages the rich kids have in a rigged system are the same as when I was a child. This time I am on the other side of the system and can see it even more plainly. It's all very well expressing sentiment and ideology but what good is that to children today who are dealing with the current system with no hope of majority, meaningful reform that will help them? Do we just write off this generation while politicians once again fail to tackle the underlying issues? No political party is even talking about this stuff properly, let alone making any moves to address anything. They are too busy taxing private schools (massive red herring btw!) to bother with getting to grips with the inherent inequality that is at the core of state education.

So is my proposed solution ideal? No. Will it solve everything? Absolutely not.

Catchments for schools could be redrawn to purposely make them more balanced even if this includes areas further away from the school. No, this won't be possible everywhere but it could quite obviously be done in my area.

I agree I shouldn't get school bus travel free but neither should the millionaire pensioners. What's good for the goose is good for the gander. If means testing is genuinely too expensive then the only way to avoid giving this to people that don't need it is to give it nobody.

And that is a CHOICE.

The legal framework under the care act 2014 covers eligible care needs. If you want those care needs to be met in a much more expensive place that is your CHOICE.

If you want a bigger better car you pay more - that is your choice.

The LAW and duty of care are us meeting needs, not wants.

And within that framework there are CHOICES.

If you decide you want to use a private hospital instead of NHS services that is your CHOICE.

You have tried to say that people with eligible care needs for a care setting have no choice where they go - entirely untrue.

Choice that you pay for via top ups if there are no care needs warranting your choice of a more expensive residential home.

If everyone gets free bus travel to the nice school so they don't have to walk to the crap school on their doorstep...

Who is supposed to go to the crap schools?

Realistically are all parents and children committed to travel further to the better school? Right now lots of parents could send their children to better schools if they were prepared to make that commitment and yet they don't.

Using your own logic, are you suggesting that we need to stop poor children from travelling to better schools so that some kids are at that rubbish schools? Are they the sacrificial lamb?

Oh for gods sake - I have written it several times.

once more for those in the cheap seats - people who have care needs that require meeting in a care setting get CHOICES. That are not given one single place and that’s that. Part of the reason it can take a while to get a setting locked down is because the individuals and families take a look at the settings (not one setting, PLURAL. Multiple) and turn them all down.

THEY HAVE CHOICES of settings that MEET THEIR CARE NEEDS.

Im due to get an operation and I don’t really like my local hospital, I don’t like the others under ‘right to choose’ either…so I’ve decided I want the Royal Marsden…should I get it for free just because I SAY SO? No. I had choices, I didn’t want them.

And again for those in the cheap seats. Not talking about those with care needs but those who choose a more expensive setting simply because of choice. They have to pay top ups.