Caithness.org News Bulletins

Bus Service Withdrawal - Parents To Protest
Scrabster parents faced with the withdrawal of bus services that normally took their children to school are planning to hold a protest march.  Over 40 families in the Scrabster area alone are affected by the withdrawal of bus services by Rapson's  buses who say that the failure to secure the the school contracts means that the routes are no longer financially viable.  Various places in Caithness are affected to one degree or another.  Parents acknowledge that the council is not directly to blame for the sudden withdrawal of the services and accept that the interim measures will hold the situation for two weeks after the school children return after the holidays but are anxious about the arrangements after that.  Councillors are trying to see if there is any way to resolve the situation.  It is the loss of contracts to carry children free of charge that has had a knock on effect on children who pay to travel to school because of the three mile limit.  Free transport is available for children who live more than three miles from school.  But the children who live less than three miles from the school are often carried on the same bus paying fares as the children who were uplifted further out. 

Where a carrier picks up both subsidised passengers and fare paying passengers any loss of a contract affects the viability of the route as has happened in this case.  The bus company has decided to cease the affected routes and therefore it would no longer be available to anyone subsidised or full fare paying.  This is the problem the council now faces in trying to sort it out.

The parents at Scrabster are going to march from Scrabster to Pennyland Primary and Thurso High Schools