Public Petitions Committee, 15 Dec 2009

Meeting date: Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Official Report 250KB pdf

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Current Petitions

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School Bus Safety (PE1098 and PE1223)

We have two petitions for our immediate attention this afternoon. PE1098 calls on the Parliament to urge the Government to make provision for three-point seat belts to be installed on every school bus for every schoolchild passenger and to ensure that, as part of local authorities' consideration of best value in the provision of school buses, proper regard is given to the children's safety needs. PE1223 calls on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Government to take all appropriate action—by amending guidance, contracts, agreements or legislation—to require local authorities to install on school buses proper safety signage and lights, which are to be used only when schoolchildren are on the bus and only when necessary, and to make overtaking a stationary school bus a criminal offence.

Because of ill health, only one of the petitioners can be with us this afternoon. I welcome Ron Beaty to our discussion. He has engaged not only with the committee, but with the Parliament and Scottish ministers in trying to get proper responses to the concerns that are raised in his petition. As this is a round-table discussion, we have several other participants this afternoon. I welcome Malcolm Bruce, the member of Parliament for Gordon in the north-east of Scotland. He has had a keen interest in the matter over a number of years. I also welcome Garth Goddard, from the Yellow School Bus Commission; Josh Kane, the convener of the Scottish Youth Parliament's transport, environment and rural affairs committee; and Ewan Wallace, from Aberdeenshire Council, who is here because of the discussions that have taken place in Aberdeenshire about the matters that have been raised by the petitioners. Anything that is said in the debate will be recorded in the Official Report. I hope that we can have an open and honest discussion about the roles that we can all play in relation to the issue.

I open with a question for Garth Goddard. In your experience with the Yellow School Bus Commission, what initiatives have been pursued elsewhere in the United Kingdom and what has been the driving force behind those initiatives? Who do you feel is best placed to pursue such initiatives in order to ensure school bus safety?

Before I retired and became a member of the Yellow School Bus Commission, I was the transport co-ordinator for Cheshire County Council and was responsible for school transport for more years than I care to say. There are two sorts of school transport. The first is the free school transport that local authorities are required by statute to provide for children. However, three quarters of children do not qualify for free transport and must use public transport or cars. The Yellow School Bus Commission has looked at that sector of the total school population and asked whether we should not get more of those children on to effective school transport for safety and environmental reasons. The yellow bus provides a clear opportunity to do that—it is our raison d'être.

A number of yellow bus schemes already operate in the United Kingdom. Most of them provide statutory school transport for the pupils whom the local authorities are responsible for transporting anyway. When I worked in Cheshire, I was one of the first transport co-ordinators to purchase some American yellow school buses to replace the conventional buses that had previously been provided by the private sector contractors. By and large, the schemes have shown that we can improve the safety standard and quality of school transport by investing in purpose-built buses such as those with which people in the United States are very familiar—we see them almost every time that we watch "The Simpsons".

Yellow buses have gone down very well in this country, too. Where yellow school bus schemes have been introduced, they have been popular with parents, children and schools. It is particularly important that they are popular with children, because they have helped to address behavioural problems on buses. If children travel to school on buses that are 20 or 30 years old and are a bit shabby, they are less likely to take care of them than if they have their own yellow school bus with their identified seat and are familiar with the driver and so on. Our experience is that yellow school buses are a big plus from that point of view. From the safety and behavioural points of view, they have been shown to be good.

Yellow school buses have been effective in the schemes that have been introduced in Britain. All the schemes apart from the biggest one have been local authority initiatives, because local authorities are ultimately responsible for school transport. The UK's biggest scheme, which is in West Yorkshire, has been funded as an experiment by the Department for Transport. That has been really interesting, because it has shown the impact of having not just one or two buses, as I had in Cheshire, but a large number of yellow buses operating to a number of schools in West Yorkshire. The DFT has been monitoring that experiment and I hope that it will draw positive conclusions from it.

The Yellow Bus Commission has looked at the issue in enormous detail. We used the University of Aberdeen to do technical work for us, which has shown not only that yellow bus schemes are popular but that they can be effective in cost benefit terms, particularly in relation to children who are not eligible for free transport: if we get large numbers of children out of cars and on to yellow buses, we can produce a substantial cost benefit from that investment.

Yellow school buses are about local authority initiatives, and perhaps central Government initiatives as well. They are about making substantial improvements, but they are also about money. The bottom line is that the sum of money that we need to find if we want to invest in yellow buses is not small, but our research has shown that such initiatives can be really effective in terms of both cost benefit and safety.

There are also environmental benefits. If we introduce more buses and get more children on to public transport, there are two major benefits. First, we reduce the number of cars that buzz around schools and cause safety problems. Secondly, we say to children during their formative years, "This is what public transport is about, and it can be a positive thing", so that, we hope, we capture them for the longer term.

Has an assessment been done of children's and parents' views of the buses?

Yes.

What were the key messages from that?

The key message is that children and parents like them. Parents and users were surveyed extensively when the Yellow Bus Commission had an exhibition that toured around the country with a yellow bus, and we got positive results throughout. Perhaps more effective, however, is the impact of particular schemes that are operating now. As I said, we find that schools, parents and children are all positive about them.

One of the best schemes is at a primary school in Basingstoke in Hampshire. Young children are happily transported to school in mass transport by yellow buses. Parents are delighted and children are very happy with the scheme. It was introduced because there was too much car congestion around the school, and it has brought real benefits in that respect. In addition, parents like the fact that they are no longer responsible for getting into their car and taking their children to school. Instead, they hand their children over to a safe environment. That is an important aspect of encouraging more people to consider public transport for their child's journey to school.

On the importance of a safe environment, in your experience do the yellow buses have higher specifications than the other options that are available?

Yes, the yellow buses have high specifications. The American yellow buses that we imported are built like tanks so, if they are involved in any sort of accident, we can be sure that they will come off better. They provide a safe environment. Generally, the buses are built with children rather than adults in mind, so the seating dimensions—the spacing of seats and so on—have been thought through. All the seats have three-point seat belts, which is really positive.

Other specifications are also available. One specification that we had on our yellow school buses was to have a radio on the bus to entertain the children, which they really liked. If they were naughty, instead of getting Radio 1, they would get Radio 4. That presents a worthwhile opportunity to get the children to identify with and enjoy the experience of going to school. Another important specification is closed-circuit television.

We would have "Good Morning Scotland", but there we go.

Garth Goddard stated that yellow buses are safer and, if I understood him correctly, he implied that they suffer slightly lower levels of vandalism. Are there any hard figures on that to give us a clearer idea of the benefits?

Vandalism is an issue that everyone has experience of, but it is difficult to quantify. As someone who ran a small number of yellow buses in Cheshire, I can confirm that there were far fewer behavioural problems on the yellow buses than on the conventional school transport that I provided elsewhere in the county. From my personal experience, I can give an assurance that that is the case.

The safety benefits are also difficult to quantify because buses are generally a very safe mode of transport. Statistically, the number of accidents, injuries and fatalities arising from bus travel is very low, so we do not have enough data to be able to say that a yellow bus is safer than a conventional bus. However, intuitively, we can say that a bus with built-in safety features such as seat belts and crash resistance will perform more satisfactorily than the older bus that is often the norm for school transport.

I suppose that studies in the States—although they would not be quite the same thing—could provide us with some hard figures.

That is an interesting point because we know that yellow buses are ubiquitous in the United States.

Another interesting point is that the United States has a totally different culture in respect of the way in which other road users treat the yellow buses. As probably everyone knows, if a yellow bus in the United States is loading or unloading passengers, drivers must stop and may not overtake. The fact that there is no passing traffic immediately reduces a considerable danger in carrying children by bus to school. Anecdotally, I know that my commission colleague who visited the United States to talk to yellow bus operators generally got the view that, as I said, the yellow buses are built like tanks and are very crash resistant. The apparent experience in the United States is that the nature of the vehicle means that the danger to the children in an accident situation is much lower.

You said that drivers in the States may not overtake yellow buses when passengers are dismounting. Are there any statistics on the extent to which that has reduced the number of accidents involving children being knocked down while leaving or being in the vicinity of a school bus?

Are you asking about the data in this country?

Are such data available in this country or in the States?

Those data will be available, but I do not have them to hand to comment on. However, an issue in the United Kingdom is that from time to time serious accidents occur in which children get off the school bus, cross the road in front of or behind it and are knocked down by a passing motor vehicle. That is one of the real problems with the journey to school. The issue is not so much about the children being on the bus and the danger of the bus crashing; it is the situation that the children are in immediately prior to getting on the vehicle or immediately after leaving it.

Is there any adult supervision of the children on yellow buses, other than that by the bus driver?

Broadly, no. One interesting thing about yellow bus schemes is that the drivers tend to be hand picked and specifically trained to deal with the children. It is about building the right sort of relationship between the drivers and the children, which helps a great deal in the supervision of the children. In my experience of working in local authority transport, it is an expensive business to have an escort, as we called them, on all school buses, which is not justified. If there is a problem on a particular route, a temporary escort can be put on. That is probably the best way forward. It would be overkill to expect every school bus to have an escort. An escort is even less important with yellow buses because of the benefits that I talked about of better behaviour and driver identification with the children whom they carry.

That is interesting. When I was a local authority member, I tried to get a bus for some fee-paying schools. Three fee-paying schools were interested in having a school bus to take some of the congestion off the roads at peak times. That fell flat on its face because the schools could not get adults to do the supervision regularly and the scheme would not be sanctioned without a supervising adult. It is interesting that yellow buses do not have such adults.

Garth Goddard is doing really well, but this is almost like a prosecution, when it is meant to be a round-table meeting.

I venture that it is far more important to have somebody on the road to greet the buses and shepherd the children than to have somebody on the bus. That should be relatively easy for schools to arrange, either with volunteer parents or by finding money to pay the equivalent of a lollipop person to stand on the road. That is the point when the danger arises—it is not while the children are on the bus.

Are there any other broad points on that topic?

I have a comment on Bill Wilson's question about whether there are any figures in the UK for school bus deaths or accidents. Those figures do not exist. Although figures are collected through the stats19 system, they are inaccurate because of the way in which they are recorded by police, hospitals and emergency services in general. I believe that a new form is being produced but, basically, a school bus accident is treated as a child pedestrian accident. That is why figures are so hard to come by.

Do you know whether the figures exist in the States, where school buses have been used for far longer?

I think that in the States the overall figure is something like 0.5 per cent out of 164 million miles that are covered per year—it is a small figure.

Do you have any idea of the accident rate for passengers leaving other buses?

Not really. Those accidents are lumped in with other figures. You would have to go to the Government site to find that out, but the statistics are not 100 per cent accurate by any means. People involved with stats19 have admitted that to us.

Our commission could consider the issue to see whether we can unearth more information on the statistics, if that would help.

Just this week, a local councillor raised with me the difficulty at this time of year of seeing pupils when they come off school buses. They tend to wear dark clothing nowadays that has no high-visibility attachments. Does the yellow bus scheme provide armbands that people can see, or something like that?

I am not aware of any yellow bus schemes that do that. However, it could be done, and it is already done in the context of what are often referred to as walking buses, in which platoons of children are supervised to walk to school where the journey is less than, say, 1 mile. In the Yellow School Bus Commission, we very much encourage children to walk to school. We do not want every schoolchild to be transported by bus. Clearly, if they have less than 1 mile to go to get to school, walking is a healthier alternative for them. When someone organises children to walk to school, they perhaps provide high-visibility vests, as well as escorts at the front and rear. The suggestion that children might wear some identifier for when they get off a school bus possibly merits consideration.

You said that, by and large, pupils like the yellow bus for various reasons, including safety. Do we know the views of children who are not fortunate enough to be in such a scheme? I have not specifically asked children in my area what they think about bus safety. I do not know whether any work has been done on that.

We have a representative here from the Scottish Youth Parliament who might be able to help us on that question. However, I can tell you that I addressed the UK Youth Parliament at its annual session in Canterbury last summer and spoke to two quite big groups of representatives, who were all enthusiastic about yellow buses. The commission's general experience is that, when we talk to children who do not have yellow buses or who have conventional buses, they often ask when they are getting a yellow bus. There is therefore enthusiasm for the yellow bus among children.

Some of the ideas sound excellent in theory, but I do not think that they will be effective in practice. You should try to find a young adult who will wear a wristband getting off a bus—they will not do it and are not really up for it. Robin Harper said that perhaps there could be escorts on buses, which is possibly a better idea. However, can schools do that? Some schools have perhaps eight or nine school buses, and it is not possible to get an escort on each bus.

On behaviour on school buses, we must consider the safety not of the school bus itself but of the children, which opens up another aspect that perhaps has to be looked into.

My main point is on statistics, to which Ron Beaty and Garth Goddard have already referred. We did a bit of work on the back of an accident in 2006 that involved one of our home-to-school transport vehicles. We had discussions with the Transport Research Laboratory, particularly on the seat belts issue. Certainly, the TRL reinforced some of the numbers that Ron Beaty quoted from the United States of America. We are talking about a one in 17 million chance of an accident involving a home-to-school transport vehicle—the statistical levels, in terms of the number of incidents, are very small. However, the TRL research identified that, when such accidents happen, they tend to be very serious because the vehicles have multiple occupants. The TRL also looked at the impact of different types of seat belts.

If the committee is to take the matter further, as well as talking to the Yellow School Bus Commission, you should also have discussions with the TRL, the Department for Transport and Scottish Government statisticians because they will have the best handle on the type of information that would start to flesh out how to take the issue forward.

We heard from Garth Goddard about the progress that some local authorities are making. We have heard about Aberdeenshire Council's experience. The issue has been explained to us before—some powers are reserved, but some issues can be developed through Scottish transport bodies. Given that much of the cost could fall on councils, where do local authorities fit in?

I can add some background to that. In Aberdeenshire, we transport close to 14,000 pupils every day to all the schools in the north-east. Three or four authorities in Scotland perform that function at a similar level. We spend £15 million annually on such contracts. A lot is happening out there—that is a big bit of a local authority's business.

We have considered several ways in which we can make a difference, such as altering contracts before the next round of contracts starts next year and trialling different signage for the back of buses to make them more visible to drivers, so that it is more obvious that they are approaching a school transport vehicle. To pick up Mr Harper's point, we have considered having something at pick-up and drop-off points. We have talked to Swedish colleagues about a flashing signage system that they use at particular pick-up and drop-off points. We have about 15 strands of work on what we can do, but the convener is right to say that local authorities do not have the ability to achieve all of them. For example, flashing signage on the back of buses starts to fall into the scope of vehicle use regulations, which the Department for Transport deals with. A range of matters is associated with that work.

Josh Kane talked about interaction with pupils. One advantage for a local authority is that we also deliver the education function in schools. I cannot overstate the advantages of regular joint work in every school, so that we know each school's views on its transport requirements.

I am looking at the numbers of young people who have been killed or seriously injured or who have been in other accidents. It is remarkable that, between the ages of 10 and 12, the numbers of children who are killed or seriously injured treble and the numbers who are in other accidents quadruple. Has research been conducted into what needs to be done to address that sudden rise involving these children, particularly in pedestrian accidents? Are those increases associated with particular pedestrian accidents, such as those that occur when children get off buses and dash across the road unsupervised? I just throw that into the general mix. The rise in the figures is astonishing. A similar rise occurs in all forms of accidents among children between the ages of 10 and 12.

I will bring in Malcolm Bruce, who introduced a private member's bill on school buses and has had dialogue with UK transport ministers about opening up the debate and being more proactive.

The statistics reveal that the rise in deaths, injuries and accidents to which Robin Harper referred has a lot to do with the fact that children at the age that he mentioned have confidence but not experience, so they tend to push their luck.

I am still in that age group.

One of my daughters is 10, and I can see such behaviour starting to happen.

I commend Aberdeenshire Council and other authorities that are proactively developing measures, but they cannot do everything in law. I am worried that different authorities will move in different directions and that co-ordination is lacking. A role for the respective transport departments is to provide—at the very least—some kind of framework without inhibiting the development work that is going on.

There are three issues that people were most persistent in raising with me when I was promoting my private member's bill. The first is why we do not have a no-overtaking rule and why there has not even been a pilot scheme. When I first raised the matter with the Government, Sadiq Khan, who is Minister of State for Transport, seemed keen on the idea of a cross-Scotland pilot. However, in a subsequent meeting, he seemed to imply that he did not get the feeling that there was a will in Scotland to do that. I am not sure whether that was because of an inhibition on money or any other factor, but what he told me does not accord with what people at the other end have been saying. I am unclear why that pilot could not happen. The issue is controversial—not everyone agrees that the idea is a good one—but a pilot scheme might help to test the reality. Obviously, from experience, Garth Goddard believes that the evidence would be positive.

The second issue is that of seat belts. I accept the statistical evidence that accidents do not happen very often, but at least one accident in Aberdeenshire caused concern and generated a lot of campaigning activity. The question is: if wearing seat belts is made the rule, should seat belts not be standardised? People want to know whether lap belts or three-point belts will be specified. When I spoke to it, the Department for Transport said that it had identified a problem with European law, but I found what it told me a little odd. The department implied that a seat belt requirement on school bus providers would be seen as an infringement on competition. The argument did not seem to be realistic: I cannot see Belgian or Italian bus providers rushing to make contracts with Aberdeenshire Council. Anything that the committee can do to clarify the situation would be helpful.

The third issue—and perhaps the best one to pursue—is that of electronic signage, which Ewan Wallace mentioned. We had a very good meeting in Inverurie on the subject, and I have discussed it with ministers, in the House of Commons and with other people. There are a lot of ideas on how signage could be improved. One example is interactive signage at bus stops that alerts people that a bus is approaching and that drivers should slow down. Such signage could be coupled with flashing signs on school buses. The issue poses the question what the law allows a local authority to do. If authorities were given a fair amount of discretion, would that be helpful? What if authorities were to have completely different systems?

At the end of the process, I was left with the belief that the respective departments have a clear role in co-ordination and leadership. Ewan Wallace made the point that we should respect the huge amount of front-line experience that the education authorities that are providing the transport have. The departments should not be inhibited but be liberated by that; they should try to co-ordinate the bringing forward of best practice.

At the end of the day, despite a great dialogue in which a lot of very good ideas were raised, neither the Department for Transport nor the respective Scottish Government department has made any concrete development on how to make the situation safer.

Robin Harper made a suggestion about co-ordinating better how children get on to the buses, which could be done. However, in the north-east, the accidents happened when children were on their way home—when they were getting off the buses. Parents witnessed an accident that was not entirely the fault of the child. There was perhaps a lack of concentration on their part, but the accident happened because the driver of the vehicle who hit the child was moving far too fast and without due consideration. Clearly, flashing signs and a no-overtaking rule would make a difference.

In the north-east, people are fairly clear about what has happened and what they would like to happen. They are also fairly frustrated that we are getting no positive action.

Thanks for that, Malcolm. Your evidence is important. We are caught in the middle on this one; there are powers at both Scottish and UK ends. We want to drive this forward.

I am delighted that Malcolm Bruce is at committee. Clearly, the matter is complicated: different people have different responsibilities. I would like an answer to a question that the BBC put to me yesterday and which I could not answer. Is there confusion about who has which powers, or is it clear who has which powers and that the problem is the complexity of the matter? Clearly, we need to be able to distinguish between the two.

It depends which powers we are talking about. Let us take the no-overtaking rule, the power for which lies with the UK Department for Transport. The minister to whom I spoke told me that he has the discretion to allow a pilot scheme in Scotland. It is not clear to me why that has not proved possible; I have not received a satisfactory answer to the question. Similarly, I understand that there is nothing to stop a local authority including in bus operator contracts a requirement for three-point seat belts; Ewan Wallace will correct me if I am wrong. It could be an education requirement for all local authorities to insist on such seat belts. In that case, responsibility could be split between the UK and Scottish authorities or could be fully devolved.

The issue of signage is pretty much devolved, although Ewan Wallace makes the point that road traffic regulations might come into play. You are right to say that the position is confused and complicated. There are things that can be done in Scotland without reference to the UK Government, but there are other things that require co-ordination, at the very least.

You have confirmed to me not only that the position is complicated but that there is a degree of confusion. We need to address that issue.

I invite Ron Beaty to comment on the issue, which he has raised consistently.

Malcolm Bruce mentioned Europe, and I do not know whether he has seen the 2009 report on road safety in schools. I and others understand from reading the report that it is fully supportive of the no-passing law. However, as often happens in the European Union, not much seems to have been done much about that.

Flashing signs are an utter necessity. Lighting regulations have been mentioned. East Riding of Yorkshire Council has trialled a school bus that, in addition to the school sign, has a safety flashing sign that says "Caution Children Crossing", with four strobe lights. That is brilliant, because it immediately draws the driver's attention to the fact that something is going on.

There are problems with the legality of school bus signs. The question is: should they be removed when the school run is finished? I think that they should be on the bus for educational visits and so on. In its new contract, Aberdeenshire Council stipulates that bus signs must be taken down, but no points system is attached to penalise failure to do that. I realise that there are contractual problems, which need to be sorted out.

School transport has not been updated since the year dot. It is time that money was spent on the issue—a flashing sign is a necessary. All the safety experts have missed the fact that signage is on different levels on different buses: sometimes it is at the top of the bus, sometimes it is halfway down and sometimes it is in the bottom right-hand corner. When it is in the bottom right-hand corner, it cannot be seen from a heavy goods vehicle or large van that parks behind the bus. That is where extra-high hazard lights—which are found on ambulances—come in. Such lights immediately draw a driver's attention to the fact that a bus has stopped and lead them to ask themselves why it has stopped.

Signage is a problem area. East Riding of Yorkshire Council went for permission not to the Department of Transport but to the Vehicle and Operator Services Agency. VOSA said that, as far as it was concerned, there was not a problem with the proposed sign, so the council went ahead with its trial. The issue needs to be sorted out, along with others.

Unless there are other issues that members and participants in the round-table discussion would like to raise, I suggest that we move on, as there are other aspects of the petition that we would like to explore.

Ron Beaty has mentioned one scheme. In Aberdeenshire, a couple of people are trying to develop electronic sensors that flash automatically when someone passes in front of them. The technology is at an experimental stage, but Aberdeenshire Council will know about it. Many ideas are in place. However, if all of them go off in different directions in different places, that will add to the confusion instead of resolving it—I share Nigel Don's concern. The committee could help to co-ordinate matters.

Good afternoon. There seems to be a great deal of enthusiasm and support for the concept of the yellow buses—we have heard plenty of evidence of that today—but if a local authority were to go down the road of purchasing some yellow buses, there would be a tremendous capital cost attached. Could local authorities make a case to demonstrate that going down that road would lead to financial savings being made in other activities?

Our commission looked at that issue. As I have said, the work that the University of Aberdeen has done for us indicates that the costs are substantial but the benefits are very high. For example, we have identified that, if the initiative of persuading children, other than those whom councils are statutorily required to transport by bus, to use buses instead of cars were applied across the board to primary schools throughout Scotland, local authorities could expect to spend between £17 million and £18 million on acquiring the vehicles but the benefits that might spin out of that would be upwards of £40 million. It is clear that money would need to be found to do that.

How do you arrive at those figures? How do you get a benefit to cost ratio of 3:1?

The benefits are worked out by performing the widest possible cost benefit analysis. In other words, we are talking about the benefits to parents and other road users of, for example, congestion and accident reduction. It is a question of looking not just at the financial benefits but at the whole spectrum of social benefits. A strong case can be made but, as I have said, it is really a question of money.

I want to return to the school transport that local authorities have a statutory obligation to provide. At the moment, most local authorities use the tendering process to get value for money, as one would expect, but they can write into the contract whatever specification they like. If they wanted to write into the contract, "We would like yellow buses," the bidding bus operators would have to ensure that they could acquire the right tool for the job. It is an investment issue. If the local authorities were to buy the buses directly and operate them themselves, they would incur a big capital cost up front. If they were to specify the use of yellow buses in the contract, the monthly cost of the contract would be much higher, because they would be asking for new vehicles in the contract.

I could see the fellow from Aberdeenshire twitching about that, so I will ask him to speak.

I can perhaps provide some context. As I said, I cannot speak for every other authority, but Aberdeenshire Council runs 750 contracts, which means that every day about 800 vehicles transport the school kids for whom we have a statutory obligation to provide services. We own and run a small number of those vehicles ourselves—smaller-scale ones that have a low floor and are fully accessible, which are used for children who require support for learning. We already run a certain number of school transport vehicles, but we are talking about a high level of statutory provision. A significant number of vehicles are provided by the private sector contractors who operate in our communities, who employ drivers and have maintenance, such as MOTs and services, carried out in local garages, so there is a hidden element.

It strikes me that, as far as the wider economy of Aberdeenshire is concerned and given the support services that are required for the large number of small, independent providers, it is probably not feasible, from a capital point of view, to achieve a shift from the present arrangement. What can you do with the existing independent providers? Could more statutory back-up, national direction and commitment be provided by the Scottish or the UK Government? Could incentives be offered, such as reductions in cost and other aspects of support, if they were seen to bring benefits to road users in the longer term? How would that work?

We have already tried to work with the operators on types of signage and the trials that we have run. We have considered the Yellow School Bus Commission's reports, tried to build many elements that are deemed to be best practice into contracts, encouraged best practice in driver training, and rolled out interactive DVDs to get the contractors to train their drivers on their responsibilities.

Josh Kane made a point about pupils' responsibilities. The drivers of school transport vehicles and cars on the road network and parents also have responsibilities. They are all part and parcel of the situation, and we are already trying to work with them. Rather than use the stick, we try to work in partnership with them as much as possible.

That is interesting.

The evidence that we have heard, today in particular, suggests that the big problem and real danger is when school pupils step off or get on to buses rather than with their conveyance. The campaign to make vehicles that transport children as conspicuous as possible is to be commended. Anything that can be achieved in that regard would help.

I am still confused about one thing. PE1098 says that seat belts should be fitted in all school conveyance vehicles. Initially, that appears to be quite a simple suggestion, but it was not specified that there have to be three-point linkages. It is fairly simple to put in lap belt arrangements, but putting in three-point fixings is altogether different. Have the bus operators commented on the difference in costs between lap belts and three-point linkages?

The extra cost of having a new bus with 40 seats fitted with three-point belts would be around £4,500. That would be the total cost for a new, conventional single-decker bus that costs £140,000-plus, so the cost of getting those belts fitted in new buses is relatively modest. However, trying to retrofit belts in existing buses that have not been properly designed to cope with belts is a problem. The cost of that would come to a minimum of around £8,000 per bus; it would possibly be much more if there were no easy anchorage points.

So the earlier there are discussions about specifications, the better.

Yes.

For normal motor vehicles, there are child seats with seat belts because adult seat belts do not fit children. If buses are supposed to be run for children between the ages of five and 16, will one type of seat belt be sufficient? Will it cover that entire age group? It is obvious that there are huge differences in the sizes of children.

That is an interesting question. An issue is whether very small children need booster seats as well. I understand that the three-point belts that are being fitted in modern buses are specifically designed to cope with the problem. That may not be a perfect solution, but the issue is clearly in the minds of the people who supply belts for the buses.

I was going to say something else, but I have forgotten what it was. I am sorry.

Do not worry, Garth. I have senior moments as well.

I am keen to explore how we can get the two responsible bodies—the Scottish Government and the UK Parliament—working a bit better, and what initiatives we want to examine as a result of what we have heard. I am conscious that we have already spent a fair amount of time discussing the petitions and that there are other items on the agenda, so in the remaining time that we have I would like people to focus on those things.

As Malcolm Bruce said, it seems perfectly possible for a no-overtaking pilot scheme to be instructed by the UK Government and carried out north of the border. Could we correspond with the UK and Scottish Governments to see whether they can work together to do something that does not seem to be outwith the powers that are available?

Instead of making this just a UK Government and Scottish Government initiative, it might be useful to incorporate local authorities, too. As we have found previously in considering the introduction of new measures, cost variances can apply across the 32 local authorities. If we are to ask for a pilot to be carried out, we need to consider the costs of putting such measures in place. How would the measures apply? Would they apply to the vehicles that transport the school pupils? I am also thinking of stand-alone signage on the road that comes on when a bus or school vehicle stops, like the signage that currently applies to 20mph limits on approaches to schools. We need to get down to the basics of what a pilot scheme would entail and what costs would be associated with it. Pilot schemes do not come cost free.

Any pilot might not end up being Scotland-wide. As in the past, we could ask one or two local authorities to participate in the pilot—but being fully aware of the cost restrictions that might apply and of the measures that might be required to operate such a scheme in a way that brings accurate results.

We can do some calculations about the introduction of yellow buses. How long do the yellow buses that are purchased by local authorities operate for? The school year lasts only 38 weeks, which means that there are 14 weeks when the buses are not used. How do we restore the buses? What do we do with them? There are issues around cost.

I agree with the point about pilot schemes, but we need to be clear about how they would be funded and who would deliver the pilots. We could not do a Scotland-wide pilot.

It would be worth pointing out to local authorities, if we add them in as John Wilson has suggested, that the most important time for road safety education for young people is not in the final year of primary school but in the first year of secondary school, which is when the peak number of accidents and injuries occurs.

I want to pull those points together. We have taken note of the suggestion that we seek further information about good models elsewhere in the UK. The Yellow School Bus Commission has indicated that it will be happy to explore some of the issues, if we are able to engage in dialogue. Malcolm Bruce, Nigel Don and John Wilson have spoken about discussions with the appropriate ministers, in both the Scottish Government and the UK Government. Robin Harper has spoken about the statistical emphasis and where the biggest impact of accidents lies. Let us pull all those things together and explore them with the appropriate agencies.

Are there any other useful suggestions or observations from members and other participants?

The no-overtaking rule is not universally supported, but the argument for piloting it in Scotland is that, as Scotland is a distinct entity with suitable communication means, people would know about the policy. The arguments against having a pilot in one or two localities are that people would not know about it easily, it would cause confusion, and it might not provide a good base test. Those points were part of the discussion and must be part of the balance.

I am more concerned about the developments on signage than anything else. Technology is moving at a rapid rate and people are doing different things in different places. The two Government departments should work together, co-ordinate with the local authorities on best practice and recognise that the best ideas probably come from the local authorities rather than from the top down. That is where the biggest breadth of support seems to be, as well as the greatest possibility of getting concrete results that would hit the public, make children aware and improve safety.

Perhaps Ewan Wallace would like to make a final comment on Malcolm Bruce's invitation for local authorities to take some ownership of the matter.

It is not only Aberdeenshire Council that has done work on the matter; a sizeable number of authorities throughout Scotland are working along similar lines. It is always difficult for the UK Government and the Scottish Government to talk to so many individual bodies, but there are umbrella organisations that can bring together and co-ordinate the development of best practice in discussion forums and work with the Scottish Government and the Department for Transport. On the public transport side, there are bodies such as the Association of Transport Co-ordinating Officers, which is a key organisation; on the road safety education side, there is Road Safety Scotland, which delivers a number of different initiatives; and, from the local authority perspective, there is the Society of Chief Officers Transportation in Scotland.

I am conscious that there are other major petitioners waiting to speak to us as well. There is a lot in what has been said. I thank those who travelled up a long distance and those who have come down from the north-east for the meeting. Through the petitions that Ron Beaty and the other petitioners submitted, we know that there is a lot of public support for exploring the issues, and we want to try to find satisfactory solutions. We want to explore the key issues that have been raised and, in particular, try to bring together the two different departments in much more effective dialogue. We will take a graded approach towards things that we can do now, things that we would like to do if resources permit, and long-term measures that are major investment issues and require partnerships between local and national Government. We would be happy to explore the statistics that exist or should be collected on children's safety in school transport.

I hope that the meeting has been of benefit to those who managed to attend for the petitions. I do not know whether it is the first time that Malcolm Bruce has been in a Scottish Parliament committee.

It is the second time.

I hope that it was as gentle as the last time.