Parents urge council 'work with us' on funding cuts

As a council looks to fill a £5.4m pound hole in its budget, parents are urging it to "work with them" when making decisions over cuts.

Oxfordshire County Council's cabinet is due to meet later to agree plans to present a balanced budget next month.

The latest round of cuts include £250,000 to its school transport programme, with parents and carers saying more needed to be done to make sure no children were negatively affected by the changes.

The council said the proposals would "enhance efficiency without compromising quality."

Catherine Chapman has been trying to save her children's school bus service from being cut and is now involved in a lengthy appeals process which she said was taking up council time and money.

Chapman said she understood the council needed to save money, but that it did not help itself by over complicating processes.

"Even in our family, we have two appeal tracks going. You can use that as a multiplier across the whole bus and think of the number of hours that has created.

"It is massively inefficient," she added.

Instead, Chapman said she wanted to work with the council to help find areas to save money.

"The kids themselves and us parents, with feet on the ground, have some ideas of what those things could be .. but Oxfordshire County Council are not looking at it holistically," she added.

And it's a similar message from parents of children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND).

Dr Claire El Mouden of Oxfordshire SEND Parent Action Group said efficiencies could "easily" be found in SEND transport, but only if they were done in the right areas.

El Mouden said "thousands" could be saved through better communication, with parents being able to cancel taxis when their children have unexpected time off school.

But she cited problems in areas liked sharing taxis, where children with additional needs can become anxious when traveling with others, and complex pick ups result in children becoming late for school.

El Mouden said: "It's an awful time for government funding, I get that, and I think savings could be made, but they really need to work with the end user collaboratively."

"Lay out the problem and let's work out the solution," she added.

Liberal Democrat-run Oxfordshire County Council is legally obliged to present a balanced budget for approval by the full council on10 February.

Dan Levy, cabinet member for finance, said: "Money is being redistributed away from Oxfordshire and other areas on a large scale by the government.

"There will be very real impacts on our budgets and our services in future."