A PARENT is concerned that school buses are being overcrowded following an incident where children were injured.

Linda Jennings, of Changegate, Haworth, said that at the end of October her daughter was hurt and taken to hospital after her school bus braked violently.

She said: "It happened in the morning on the way to Parkside School. The bus braked suddenly throwing all the children forward and some of them were injured.

"My daughter banged her head, one of the seats came lose and an iron bar came off the bus.

"Thankfully, she was all right but we took her to hospital as a precaution.

"The buses are consistently overcrowded, which increases the risk of children being hurt when something like this happens. We pay for her to get to school and we are paying for a safe service.

She added: "I've counted over 90 children getting off the bus before, and I've heard that there are sometimes between 13 and 18 children standing on the bus.

"Before the accident, they used to stop at all the stops but now they just stop at alternate stops -- it should be monitored more thoroughly though.

"What's the point of government legislation about children wearing seatbelts in cars if they're going to be herded on to buses like this. There needs to be some sort of safety rules."

A spokesman for Education Bradford, which runs school bus contracts on behalf of Bradford Council, said: "Whenever we receive reports of overcrowding on school buses we report them to the West Yorkshire Passenger Transport Executive (WYPTE), which carries out surveys of school bus runs.

"If action is needed, the WYPTE will liaise with Education Bradford, the school and the bus company involved to make the changes needed to sort out the problem."