School travel grants for day pupils and amounts thereof
15.—(1) This regulation shall apply in relation to school travel grants in the case of an assisted pupil who is a day pupil in attendance at a participating school.
(2) In this regulation “school travel expenditure” means such amount as may be determined, in accordance with the provisions of this regulation, to be the aggregate amount of travelling expenses incurred by the parents of an assisted pupil who is a day pupil in attendance at a participating school in respect of their travel to and from the school by any of the following means:–
(a)by public transport , that is to say, by train, bus, boat, hovercraft or air services available to the public;
(b)by transport provided in pursuance of arrangements made by that school and for the time being approved by the Scottish Ministers;
(c)by any combination thereof,
where the walking distance between his home and that school exceeds 3.2 kilometres each way in the case of pupils whose age does not exceed 8 years and 4.8 kilometres each way in the case of pupils of any other age, in each case measured by the nearest available route.
(3) A school travel grant shall also be payable in respect of school travel expenditure reasonably incurred in relation to journeys actually made by the pupil in the school year within the British Islands for the purpose of attending a university, college or other establishment of further education at the invitation of the establishment with a view to being admitted to that establishment for the purpose of further education; and said grant shall be payable in respect of not more than three such journeys from the school or from the pupil’s home to such an establishment and three journeys from the establishment to the school or to the pupil’s home in any school year.
(4) A participating school, in accordance with this regulation–
(a)shall, in respect of any school year, make a school travel grant in respect of any assisted pupil in whose case this regulation applies in attendance at the school to the parents of that pupil in respect of school travel expenditure incurred by them in respect of that pupil for that year; and
(b)may, in the course of, or immediately before the commencement of any school year, make payments in advance on account of any school travel grant in respect of school travel expenditure, being grant which it appears to it will fall to be made in respect of that year to the parents of such an assisted pupil,
and, where payments are made in accordance with sub-paragraph (b), any overpayment or underpayment of grant for the year in question shall, within three months of the final determination of the amount (if any) of the school travel grant, be adjusted by payments between the parents and the school.
(5) For the purposes of determining the aggregate amounts of travelling expenses mentioned in paragraph (2), the following provisions shall apply:–
(a)where an assisted pupil’s travelling expenses are incurred in respect of journeys in excess of 40.2 kilometres each way between home and school by any of the means of transport mentioned in paragraph (2), account shall be taken of only so much of the expenses as bears the same proportion to the full amount thereof as 40.2 kilometres bears to the length in kilometres of the journey in question measured with reference to the actual distance by the nearest available route between the pupil’s home and the school;
(b)where such expenses are in respect of journeys by public transport and they are in excess of the expenses which would have been incurred if advantage had been taken of available arrangements for season tickets or reduced or concessionary fares, the excess shall be disregarded.
(6) The amount (if any) of school travel grant to be made in relation to an assisted pupil in respect of any school year in accordance with this regulation shall be determined in accordance with this paragraph by reference to the school travel expenditure incurred in respect of that pupil for that school year and to the relevant income of their parents in the preceding financial year as follows:–
(a)in any case where the relevant income does not exceed £11,129 per annum, the school travel grant shall be such sum as is equal to the amount of the school travel expenditure so incurred;
(b)in any other case, the school travel grant shall be such sum as is equal to the amount (if any) by which the school travel expenditure so incurred exceeds one twelfth rounded down to the nearest multiple of £3 of the sum by which that relevant income exceeds £10,950.