Lollipop patrols safe as city stumps up £750,000
THE threat to axe Birmingham’s lollipop people in a council cash crisis has been lifted after a backlash.
Birmingham City Council bosses have agreed to guarantee £750,000 per year funding for the school crossing patrol service over the next few years, easing the pressure after a series of high-profile job threats.
It is a marked change as the service was threatened with the axe in the last two budget rounds, only to be reprieved following public outcry and political backlash.
The funding is short of the £880,000 currently spent on the service – but council bosses have guaranteed that patrols at all priority crossings, ones where there are no alternative pelican crossings, will be maintained.
It means that the majority of the 180 wardens will not be facing redundancy when the 2017 budget plans are unveiled early next year.
Alongside the guaranteed funding, the city council is launching a new Active Children Trust to support safer travel to schools for the city’s children.
Labour council leader John Clancy, who announced plans for a Trust in the spring after the warden service was spared the axe for a second year running, said: “We are looking at how we can encourage parents, pupils and staff to adopt alternative ways of travelling to school to reduce car journeys, and improve not only their health but that of the wider community – with reduced road danger, and less air pollution and traffic conges- tion in local neighbourhoods.”
The Trust is being kick-started with £75,000 from the council plus a £25,000 donation from a major corporate sponsor – due to be confirmed in the next few weeks. Schools and parents will be able to bid for grants of up to £1,000.