Alex Trelinski
A SLEEPING boy, 4, wasn’t raised from his slumber on a Valencia school bus until it ended up at the depot.
His parents have demanded an explanation as to why nobody spotted him beforehand.
The boy is a pupil at the Santo Angel de la Guarda school in the Patraix area of the city.
He fell asleep on Monday morning and none of the supervisors on the service operated by Monbus or the driver noticed that he did not get off outside his school.
The Ministry of Education said that the hiring of supervisors to accompany young children is down to bus companies who were awarded a contract to run a school service.
The president of the Valencian Community Confederation of Student Parents, Ruben Pacheco said that it was an incident of ‘extraordinary gravity’
“The Forgotten Child seems like the title of a film that would be suitable as a plot for all of the barbarities of this company(Monbus) from the start of the school year,” he fumed.
The company is already the subject of a disciplinary investigation by the Ministry of Education after complaints that it has not fulfilled its obligations by not providing buses on several Valencia province school routes.
Pacheco said the probe was going ‘extremely slowly’ and described the whole situation as ‘unacceptable’ and ‘outrageous’.
He claimed that families were living in a state of ‘mistrust’ and ‘anguish’, and they want a more forceful response from the Education Ministry.
“We do not understand why does not take action to improve the behaviour of a company that provides such a sensitive service like school transport,” Pacheco added.
There has been no comment from Monbus.
