A mum says she’s been forced to spend £60 a week to send her daughter to lessons after the family moved ‘too close’ to her school.
Melissa Newton said she is spending £240 a month on taxis to transport six-year-old Aliyah to and from school.
Aliyah used to take a minibus between their former home in Tunstall in Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, and Burnwood Community Primary School in Chell Heath.
But she is no longer eligible for free transport after the family moved to the other side of Tunstall and within two miles of the school, StokeonTrentLive reports.
Melissa, 29, said the only alternative to the paid taxi rides is a 3.6-mile round-trip walk.
The mum-of-two said: “Now we’ve moved house, they are refusing to send the bus.
"The first few weeks, we walked it but it was uphill and it was about 1.8 miles to get there.
"It wouldn’t be so bad if we were on a bus route but, for the last 11 months, I’ve been spending £60 a week on a taxi.
“It’s now been suggested I try to take her to Mill Hill Primary Academy but she didn’t get in originally because she was out of the catchment area. She’s also settled in at Burnwood so I just don’t know what to do.
“I’m spending £240 a month that would be better spent on the children.”
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Melissa admits she failed to double check whether the free minibus service would continue when she moved across town.
She said: “It was the school holidays when we moved, so I just thought they would continue to send the school bus, but I’ve been told they can’t do it.
“I’m hoping the school will at least agree to collect my daughter in the morning so that would halve my costs to just £30 a week.”
Melissa’s autistic son is due to move school soon, meaning she will have to drop off her daughter and then get to her son’s school.
She added: “There’s a bus stop at the bottom of Furlong Road, so they could run a bus service to there.
“The old service would pick my daughter up daily and she would go to breakfast club, so that was good. It’s costing me an absolute fortune now and this is money that could be spent on my kids instead.”
Burnwood Community School said it was unable to comment on an individual case.
Primary pupils only qualify for statutory free transport if they live more than two miles away from their nearest school.
Stoke-on-Trent City Council confirmed it would not organise transport as Alliyah does not qualify.
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