A crèche in the Vega Baja has been reported by the Guardia Civil for providing a transport service to pick up and drop off children without authorisation or obligatory public liability insurance.
The people-carrier vehicle was stopped on June 17 on the CV-920 road in Rojales, as part of the force’s campaign to inspect school transport services for safety.
Guardia Civil traffic officers based in Torrevieja found that although it only had nine seats, it was carrying 12 children, as well as the driver.
Most of the children were not wearing seatbelts or in obligatory child safety seats, and four of them were standing up spread around the vehicle.
The officers discovered that the vehicle collected the children from their homes every day and took them to an infant and primary school in the Vega Baja area, and took them back home afterwards.
Moreover, the school charged families between €40 and €50 per child for this service.
Other very serious traffic rule violations they found included that the driver did not have the required qualification to provide regular school transport, or authorisation to provide public school transport.
Furthermore, in violation of the law on safety for school and child transport, the vehicle did not have approval to accredit that it met the required technical requirements to transport children, each child did not have their own seat, it did not have the required obligatory insurance, there was no badge to indicate it was carrying children, and the passenger seat next to the driver was occupied by a 12-year-old.
All the details were reported to the regional government for the appropriate disciplinary measures to be launched.
During June in Alicante province, the Guardia Civil took action against 33 drivers for not having a licence, 55 for driving under the influence of alcohol, three for reckless driving, one for driving with drugs in their system, and one for speeding.
