A SENIOR member of East Lothian Council's administration has rebelled against colleague and council leader David Berry's call for kids who lose free transport to school to get on their bikes - describing it as his "Norman Tebbit moment".

Mr Berry's fellow SNP councillor Ruth Currie told a packed meeting of residents in her Fa'side ward on Monday that she felt Ormiston parents' "hurt and anguish" over the prospect of their children having to use a dangerous road to get to high school in Tranent.

Council education chiefs revealed at the meeting in Ormiston village hall that a local authority transport study on the Ormiston-Tranent road earlier that day had found that it was not a safe route for Ormiston school kids to walk along to get to Ross High School. It was suggested by local authority representatives that a service bus could be introduced instead - but pupils under 16 years old would have to pay 70p for a single trip, and those 16 and over £1 for a single.

An Ormiston family living less than three miles from the high school, with one 13-year-old and one 16-year-old at Ross High would, for example, have to pay approximately £70 a month on bus fares if this was introduced.

Cash-squeezed East Lothian Council aims to save £80,000 by only giving free school transport to secondary school pupils living more than three miles from their high school - in line with national regulations.

It believes it has always been very generous in its interpretation of the home-to-school regulations by currently providing free home-to-school transport for all pupils living more than two miles from their school.

But parents in some parts of the county have hit out at the planned switch, citing a lack of safe walk-to-school and cycle routes, and are unhappy at the prospect of having to pay for transport.

Approximately 70 per cent of Ormiston is within three miles of Ross High but education bosses Don Ledingham and Councillor Peter MacKenzie, who addressed about 80 residents at the meeting, stressed that no final decision would be taken until April, after all the home-to-school routes were risk-assessed. In what some at the meeting interpreted as a potentially telling slip of the tongue, Mr MacKenzie, the council's cabinet member for education, told Ormiston residents: "You will probably [he then corrected himself], you may well find that in April you will not been charged for that extra mile." Mr MacKenzie said he was proud of the low child accident rate on our roads and, in response to claims that the proposed changes would put kids' lives at risk, he said he "cherished beyond anything else the safety of children on the roads in East Lothian".

But the councillor was greeted by loud groans from the audience when he later said of the plans: "We're not doing something that's totally unreasonable. We're just doing what is the law of the land [a reference to the council following government guidelines]." Fa'side councillor and cabinet member Mrs Currie, said that she would "fight" to save free home-to-school transport in Ormiston and Macmerry.

"Dave Berry said something in the council chamber [at the budget meeting] that should not have been said when he said that children should get on their bikes," she said. "Crikey, Dave, [I thought], here's your Norman Tebbit moment.

"I'm an administration member but disagree with the idea of taking away free school transport from Ormiston.

"As a local member, I do not believe that that road (Ormiston road) is safe to walk or cycle." The pavements were not great, there was no lighting, and everyone knew the high speed of traffic on that road.

She referred to council leader Mr Berry's decision to accept a challenge from an Ormiston mum to cycle the Tranent road himself, when she said she "understood he was taking up that option on Friday (today)." One woman sarcastically said, to great support: "He ([Mr Berry] might change his mind now the council has said it's (the route) unsafe." Said Councillor Currie: "I believe any part of the village, within the three-mile zone, should have free school transport made available to it. I'm an administration member but disagree with the idea of taking away free school transport from Ormiston." There then followed cries from the audience of "you voted for it", referring to Mrs Currie and her administration colleagues approving the council's budget last month, which included the free school transport changes.

She responded: "Somewhere in that budget it looks like I voted against free school transport, but what I and others were doing was voting on the whole budget, not a narrow avenue [of it].

"What I have said to colleagues is that I will put an argument forward for this village and Macmerry to retain free school transport." Elphinstone, she said, was "slightly different" because of the council subsidy already given to the 110 bus.

Labour councillor Jim Gillies told the meeting that no-one from the administration seemed too bothered about sticking up for parents and pupils with regards the school transport changes when it came up at the budget meeting.

"Macmerry, Elphinstone and Ormiston [kids] should not have to pay to go to school," he said.

While one female audience member said: "You must provide free transport if the road is not that good." Tranent and Elphinstone community councillor Robert McNeill told her: "If you don't agree with the administration then I think that's a resignation matter." Councillor Currie said she accepted "collective responsibility".

"Many of us in the administration will disagree with certain points - It's about coming to a compromise," she stated.

"I understand the hurt and pain and anguish you [parents] face." Resident Scott Gillies said it was a "shame it took such a public outcry" for such sentiments to be echoed. Neither Councillor Berry or SNP Fa'side Councillor Kenny McLeod attended the meeting.