ALL children should not receive free bus fares in London it should be dependent on how much their parents earn and the distance they have to travel to get to school. Too often children are seen jumping in and off buses for 1 or 2 stops when they could actually walk perfectly safely to school. We do our children a disservice by providing this for all of them. Building exercise into the day can only be a good thing in terms of tackling obesity and the mental health issues young people are facing today. 

A fairer system would be to revert back to the model that was used years ago whereby a child only receives free travel if they live 3 or more miles away from thier school. Where they don’t, they should have to pay a half fare as they used to. Why should those who don’t have children have to subsidise other peoples children when in many instances they don’t need this benefit.

By moving to this model the savings could be moved to subsidising a more deserving group such as the disabled and their unpaid carers who as it stands in many cases are struggling financially and living hand to mouth. It would also go someway to making up for the lack of accessibility for this group on the rail and tube network. At present it’s extremely difficult for the disabled and thier carers to afford or navigate the existing network. By making these changes it would be a far fairer system which would both benefit children’s physical and mental health and help support the disabled and thier unpaid carers both in getting out and about but also financially.