Introduction

The School Bus Services (SBS) branch is located within the Transperth, Regional and School Bus Division of the Public Transport Authority. It arranges and manages the provision of transport services to and from schools for students at regional centres across the State and in the metropolitan area in accordance with the requirements of Government. This is predominantly provided using contracted “orange” and “green” school buses around the State. In 2004/05, SBS managed 818 school bus contracts with a budget of $69.619 million. Transport support organised by the SBS branch is used by some 24,000 students per school day.

At 30 June 2005, the “orange” and “green” school bus network included 712 school buses servicing mainstream schools and 106 school buses servicing special education schools, centres and units.

Where a school bus service could not be provided to eligible students by the PTA through SBS, a Conveyance Allowance was paid, in accordance with the Government’s student transport assistance policy.

A range of different types of contracts/services was used to provide student transport support, including:

The Composite Rate Model is an average cost model which was implemented in January 2004 and provides for contractor payments to be reviewed by an independent review panel.