A mum has slammed her local council after her son missed out on his first day at primary school because a taxi contractor arranged to transport him was cancelled without their knowledge.
It comes after Glasgow Live reported how Lanarkshire school buses were scrapped hours before the new term on Wednesday, as taxi contractors for Additional Special Needs schools also withdrew their contracts due to a "shortage of drivers".
Jack Steele, six, was all set, waiting excitedly in his school uniform for his maiden trip to Clydeview school in Motherwell, which supports primary age pupils with additional support needs.
However, Jack's transport, which was arranged by North Lanarkshire Council to pick him up and return him to his home in Newerthill, never showed on Wednesday. Nor did it show on Thursday or Friday to take him to school.
His furious and distraught mum Laura - a mum of three - said she never received any prior warning from the council that his transport arrangements had been cancelled, and hasn't received any answers since.
READ MORE: Lanarkshire school buses 'a disgrace' as services scrapped hours before new term
She told Glasgow Live: "Jack is going to an Additional Support Needs school. He was due to start primary one on Wednesday, which has already been one full year late because he was kept back in nursery one year because of covid with him shielding. So he should have started school on Wednesday. We, on Tuesday, tried to get ourselves sorted and get someone from the council to give us some information on when Jack's driver would come and meet him because we were told that a driver would come to the house and meet him beforehand so that he knew what taxi he was going in and we as parents had a bit more confidence of letting someone take our six-year-old away to school without us.
"No-one turned up at all on the Tuesday and then on the Wednesday morning we thought we'd get him ready for school anyway just in case. But again, no-one came for Jack at all. So he sat in his school uniform until about 11.30am just in case they were running late or anything like that. Same thing happened on Thursday and Friday - no one came for him.
"The thing is we cannot get in touch with anyone at North Lanarkshire Council to get an answer either way. No one has even phoned to say 'there's a delay in Jack's travel and that he wouldn't be starting school this week' or anything. There's been no communication at all. We have no idea when Jack's starting school.
"I'm on maternity leave now because I've got a four-week old baby. If I wasn't on maternity leave I would just be expected to not be at work and look after Jack which isn't possible in this climate as well. People are supposed to be at their work."
Mum Laura said the request for Jack's transport had been put in months ago, and said the school have joined her in trying to seek a response from the council as to the cancellation - to no success either.
She said: "We have no idea, the school is trying their best to chase it up as well. It's because it's the council that deals with the transport for the Additional Support Needs schools, the school put the request in months ago for a taxi for Jack, with an escort, because they thought that's what would suit Jack best instead of going on a bus full of kids for his first year, just to ease him in gently. He travels in a wheelchair and stays in the wheelchair while he is travelling as well. So the school are trying their best to chase it up. But no luck as yet from the school or us trying to do it either.
"We can't get anyone on the phone. There was an email address I was given to email and try and get some more info on, but no-one replies to the email either. So we've emailed every day. There was a Microsoft form you had to fill in to say you've not had any contact, I done it twice and still no-one has contacted us. So we've got no idea whether Jack will be going to school on Monday or not."
Laura has even considered that Jack might not end up getting to start school until the week after next, having heard of similar stories of children with additional support needs being left in the lurch by their local authorities.
She commented: "It's really important for Jack. He's not been at nursery since June either, and that's the first time he's not been at nursery over summer. And it's quite a worry for us if this is going to go on a while longer because we've given our child who is non-verbal and has quite a few medical needs to other people after quite an extended period of time after him just being in the house with us. So it just makes me worry how he is going to get on when we are away.
"What I didn't realise is this is quite common for kids phoning in for Additional Support Needs schools, I've heard stories of kids not starting school until two or three weeks later, so I'm not expecting him to be able to go next week unfortunately. I'm not in the position to take him to school either because I've got two other kids and my three-year-old starts nursery at the same time Jack would need to be at school so then I would be taking nursery time away from my three-year-old to take Jack to school. And I would be carting a four-week old about with me as well, which is quite difficult trying to organise them all at once. And then you find out Jack isn't going to school."
And Laura shared her dismay at the transport cancellation, especially given that Jack was "really excited" for his first day - coupled with "everyone else and their Granny doing first day at school pictures on Facebook" of their little ones on Wednesday.
She added: "For Jack as well he is really excited to go as well. He can't tell you he is excited but we could tell, he was kicking his legs away and sitting smiling away and he does like a shriek when he is happy, he was sitting doing that for ages. For us to then get him changed out his uniform back into his normal clothes. My main issue is with it is the complete lack of any info. See if someone phoned us and said, 'We are really sorry we haven't got transport sorted, it will two or three weeks down the line before Jack's at school' and gave us a heads up then that would have been fine.
"Obviously we would have been disappointed but at least then we would know what was happening. But we have no idea at all how long it's going to be. That should have been him eventually getting in to Primary One after not getting to go last year. I don't think Jack is the only one that's not made it to Clydeview, I think there's other kids other than Jack that haven't made it."
In response to the cancellation of school bus services and contracts for taxi contractors for Additional Special Needs schools, North Lanarkshire Council issued a statement on Wednesday which read: "We have been informed today by SPT, who organise mainstream school transport contracts on our behalf, that they have been unable to organise transport on a range of routes.
"SPT has not informed us specifically why they have been unable to carry out this task and their informing the council of these issues at the last minute is wholly unacceptable. SPT has apologised and accepted that this should not have happened. However, certainly on Wednesday August 17, the routes detailed in the table above will not run.
"In addition, a number of taxi contractors for ASN schools have withdrawn from their contracts in the last 48 hours due to a shortage of qualified drivers. SPT has apologised and is committed to working with the council to resolve these issues as quickly as possible.
"Officers from our transport team will contact families affected by ASN provision directly to discuss and explore options. For those affected by transport issues for mainstream provision, we are appealing to parents and carers to find suitable alternative means for children and young people to get to and from school.
"We make as much use of our council fleet as possible taking account of available vehicles and drivers. However, the demand for transport far exceeds this capacity. We will continue to work with SPT to resolve the issue, as well as examining other options as quickly as possible. This includes contacting all available transport providers to help us.
"We will update as soon as we have any new information, and communicate with parents via group call."
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