Parents Against Cuts in Education held a protest outside the offices of the Southern Education and Library Board (The Mall, Armagh) last week to demand that the 2pm bus service for young primary school students be continued.

The board plans to cease this service as of the 1st of September. The new board is meeting for the first time today and the group hope that its members will use this new beginning to revoke the previous decision to remove the bus service.

Parents Against Cuts in Education consists of parents from schools across the SELB‚s area, from parts of counties Down, Armagh, Tyrone, and South Derry. "The Board needed to hear at first hand how the removal of this service will directly effect schools and families." said Liam Reichenberg, parents‚ spokesperson.

A petition with thousands of signatures was handed to the chairman of the new board. "Many schools have told their parents that they cannot afford to keep the younger children after 2pm. This will cause extreme hardship to many families as often both parents work and rely on grandparents or babysitters to mind children at home when they get off the bus.

These grandparents and babysitters, in many cases, are unable to drive to schools. Are parents, usually the women, expected to quit jobs in order to collect children from school? How much would it cost if parents go back on the dole in order to collect their children? This is in contrast to the 650 million pounds of extra money allocated last month to schools in England for after-school programs to help working parents." "The Board is also removing funding for crossing patrols. This coupled with an increase in pedestrian traffic at 2pm will create a greater risk to children and parents alike."

"The Board has not assessed the impact of its decisions. It has not properly analysed the cost of removing the 2pm bus service. Given this, we question the legality of these decisions and call upon the board to revoke them." “The Board heard our deputation but I understand that they have decided not to revoke the decision to remove the 2pm Bus. Only the Sinn Fein members and councillor Ciaran Mackin voted to revoke the decision.

“The Parents group are extremely disappointed in the Board and especially so in the elected councillors, who outside the meeting pledged their support but did not support us inside the meeting.”