THE father of a 15-year-old All Hallows schoolgirl has hit out at a bus company for allowing young children to be left waiting at a bus stop outside the school in the dark because there are not enough buses to take them home.

Steve Denne, from Beacon Hill, is claiming that his daughter is often left standing for over an hour waiting for another bus to get her home.

Mr Denne claims that the problem results in children fighting to get on the bus, leaving the youngest and smallest standing on the pavement.

And he claims that on one occasion his daughter had to share a seat on a 53-seater single-deck bus when there were 30 other children standing.

"Surely it is dangerous to have a single-decker bus with 30 down the aisle and children sitting on laps," said Mr Denne.

Mr Denne is worried that when his younger 10-year-old daughter starts at the school next September she will face a similar problem.

"I pay for the ticket in advance, £130 a quarter. The clocks went back this week and after a 45-minute journey home my daughter won't get back until well after dark."

Mr Denne has repeatedly written to Stagecoach, the company that runs the Haslemere to Aldershot service, asking why the usual double-decker service which used to service the route now no longer runs.

"I feel like I'm being fobbed off, given the run around by people who are indifferent. I am banging my head against a brick wall," said an exasperated Mr Denne.

After writing a number of times he has been told that a double-decker service would no longer operate to avoid problems caused by the low Fosters Bridge near Haslemere railway station.

But Mr Denne claims to have seen a number 19 double-decker running in the area at other times of the day and say when he initially contacted the depot in September, he was given an entirely different reason for the single-decker service.

"I was assured that this was due to a shortage of resources and the double-decker had been withdrawn because the depot had lost 15 such vehicles to another depot."

Managing director of Stagecoach Andrew Dyer told The Herald that said that now that the new policy was in place, no more double-deckers would run under Fosters Bridge.

Mr Dyer said it was "very unfortunate" that the initial response was given by a manager who no longer works for the company. "It didn't get us off to a good start," he continued. "Since we first spoke to Mr Denne, the issue has been shown to be slightly different."

More than one No 19 single-decker bus does leave the school in the afternoon, but only one goes all the way to Haslemere.

"This is the first school term since the single-decker was introduced, and we've now got the problem that the Haslemere bus gets filled with people taking short trips," Mr Dyer explained.

"There is another bus for short distance rides and so we will speak to the school to try to even up the loads and solve the problem. We're confident that with the school's support we will be able to run a safe service Mr Denne will be happy with."

Mr Denne has asked for anyone who like to get in touch with him to contact him by e-mail at [email protected]">[email protected]