Education: will students run out of school buses at the start of the school year?

Noa Moussa, edited by Gauthier Delomez 06:10, August 09, 2022

According to transport professionals, 400,000 children could be deprived of school buses from September 1 for the start of the school year.

This is obviously a very worrying situation for parents who will have to completely reorganize.

"All my children do not go to the same establishment. I have two who are outside my city and who need to take the school bus for that", explains Jeanne, a mother of a large family in the Côtes. -d'Armor in Brittany, at the microphone of Europe 1.

"The place where I live, it is not possible to take my children to school myself every day, to only go back and forth. It is out of the question that I leave the little ones to the house alone, without supervision to be able to take the adults to college and high school", continues this mother.

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A shortage aggravated by the health crisis

This situation is due to a shortage of drivers.

The National Federation of Passenger Transport (FNTV) estimates that it lacks 8,000 professionals to provide maximum service, which could affect nearly one in five students.

This shortage worsened during the health crisis which hit the sector hard.

“People were placed in partial activity, they preferred to turn to other trades to have their salary at 100%”, justifies Ingrid Mareschal, general delegate of the FNTV.

"We have an average age of around 50 years old. Many drivers, young retirees in particular, preferred to leave during the health crisis so as not to be in contact with people who were susceptible", she explains. 

For the moment, it is impossible to know who will be affected by this shortage since it is still necessary to wait for the regions to establish the route of the school buses.

According to professionals in the sector, parents will only be informed a few days before the start of the school year.