Poll: Should parents be banned from driving to school gates?
Banning parents from driving to school gates as a way of tackling childhood obesity would not work in rural areas such as Shropshire, a primary school headteacher has said.
Phil Poulton, headteacher of the Ludlow Church of England School, said that rural settings should be taken into account when discussing such ideas.
It comes after Professor John Ashton, the new president of the Faculty of Public Health, said yesterday that if parents drive their children to school they should have to drop them off a few hundred yards away so children get a small amount of exercise.
"One of the things we really should be doing is strictly prohibiting cars stopping outside school to drop kids off but have drop-off points, if at all, a few hundred yards away so at least the children get to walk a quarter of a mile each day from the dropping-off point – it would make a difference," he said.
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Mr Poulton said while ideas to reduce childhood obesity are welcome, decisions on how children get to school should be left to parents. It does appear that we are heading into an obesity epidemic, if we are not there already," he said.
"Children do have images of fast food and processed foods fired at them all the time.
"Anything we can do as a nation to reduce the issue would appear welcome.
"Yes, there are children who are brought to schools who would benefit from the exercise that a walk would offer. However, there is sometimes a perception of undesirable people preying upon young people.
"This can be heightened by TV reports and dramas, but we have to accept that parents have their child's safety as a priority. Also, comments about walking to school can often be made without regard to rural settings – some of our children live as far away as a 20 minute car journey.
"There is no way that such children could ever walk to school. However, I do feel we should look at whether all this for children are entirely necessary every day of the week.
"It is a parental decision – and it always should be."
Johanna Tso, a member of the Woodfield and St George's Planning Travel Group for the two schools in the Copthorne area of Shrewsbury, said they already operate a Park and Stride scheme, which has been running for around three years. Parents park at the Beacon pub and walk their children up to school.
She said more walking should be encouraged, but prohibiting cars from stopping outside schools may take things too far.
"My issue about parking outside schools is it increases traffic. It is not only about obesity, it is road safety – that is another big issue. "We did have a community constable who used to walk from the Park and Stride.
"How they can police this is going to be interesting. When you have cuts in policing, that is not going to be a priority."
