Bedford borough Lib Dems have said school crossing patrols are “under threat” due to a proposed cut in funding.
But the Conservative administration said the proposal is to cease crossing patrols where nobody is willing to fill the vacancies.
During last week’s Budget and Corporate Services Overview and Scrutiny Committee (Thursday, 5 December), heard that the council is proposing to introduce “alternative school crossing patrol” delivery models and “build on partnership working across schools”.
Which it said would save an estimated £60,000.
Councillor Christine McHugh (Lib Dem, Goldington) asked how many crossing patrols will cease to exist as a result of this cut.
The council’s portfolio holder for finance and corporate services, councillor Graeme Coombes (Conservative, Wixams and Wilstead) said: “There are areas where there have historically been school crossing patrols where there has been difficulty in filling those roles.
“And they remain vacant.
“Therefore the objective of this is to look at those areas and say, ‘Is this ever going to be filled, or are we going to have a permanent vacancy there?’
“There’s no objective here to go anywhere where there is an existing crossing patrol and not make it happen.
“If you didn’t think that they had been promoted adequately and I’m happy to take that on board and look at that again.
“If things can be properly promoted and gaps can be filled then that is fine. But the objective here was to look at areas where there had historically been vacant positions for quite some time,” he said.
Councillor McHugh said she had the information here when some of the vacancies had last been advertised.
“February 2023 for the one that I’m particularly concerned about,” she said.
“How would you make your savings other than cutting these ones that are currently vacant because the latest recruitment happened a year ago?” she asked.
“If you want to say in your own particular ward that you think there is a case for re-advertising it, then I’m sure officers would be happy to look at that,” councillor Coombes said.
“But if it still ends up that these crossing patrols don’t get filled over time you can’t force people to do these things if nobody can actually comes forward.
“The proposal is where there is nobody coming forward… they would then cease,” he said.
by John Guinn
Local Democracy Reporter
