Parents have started a grassroots campaign to save a school bus service for children in rural areas that faces being cut.

The bus picks up children from Constantine and Mawnan Smith and drops them off at Mabe where they catch another bus to Truro College.

Cornwall Council has told parents that the service will be cut in order to make transport for over-16s "consistent and fair" across the county.

Lucy Jewson, whose son Tom is about to start at Truro College, is rallying parents and local politicians to try and stop the service being axed.

Both George Eustice MP and councillor for Budock, Mawnan and Constantine John Bastin have supported her campaign and her @saveourvillagebus Facebook page now has more than 100 likes. 

She said: "Local government needs to have special consideration for villages that don't have public transport links. 23 kids are affected, it's a lot of kids, not just one or two."

Lucy added: "What it means is that loads of parents who are working can't get their kids to Mabe."

Although the council plans to cut the service, it is not reducing the £500 annual fee for parents.

Lucy said: "It's essentially half the distance but more inconvenient."

Councillor John Bastin said: "I think that it is vital to keep this rural bus link that allows students to pick up the Truro College bus, the ball is in the court of both Cornwall Council and Truro College however neither seem to want to pick it up run with it."

Lucy was told in an email from Cornwall Council's group leader of passenger transport David Edwards that cancelling the bus service "does not constitute a change in policy, but merely an application of existing policy, thus ensuring that the provision of Post-16 Transport is consistent and fair for all 1,400 students who access it each year."

He told the Constantine mum: "The assessment of what travel arrangements are necessary for students living in Constantine and Mawnan-Smith is consistent with the approach taken across all other areas of Cornwall, and it is our belief that it is reasonable for all students to travel up to five miles to their nearest pick-up / drop-off point."

He also added that the council does provide link transport where the distance to the nearest pick-up/drop-off point is more than five miles.

Lucy has organised a meeting for affected parents tomorrow night (Wednesday July 17) at Constantine Church Hall at 7pm where she hopes they can co-ordinate an appeal to the council and save the service.

She said: "Once it's gone, it's gone for all the future generations."