Bus driver who was still at his stop refused to reopen his doors to let a stranded 16-year-old girl on 'for health and safety reasons' even when POLICE intervened, leaving the officer to have to take the teen home
A tearful young girl was refused permission to board the last bus home after the driver refused to open the doors due to 'health and safety reasons'.
The 16-year-old girl desperately pleaded with the driver to let her travel on the service from Beverley bus station to Dunswell, East Yorkshire, on Sunday, November 7, after visiting her friends.
Her pleas fell on deaf ears as the driver sounded his horn to get her to move out of the way.
A police officer, who witnessed the standoff while attending another incident at the station, eventually came over to intervene and offered the teenager a lift home.Video footage, filmed by the young girl, shows her standing in front of the East Yorkshire bus service.
The girl says: 'can you let me on the bus?' before the driver beeps his horn.
'I need to get home', she adds. 'Why? Just open the door.'
The driver beeps his horn a few more times but the girl remains in front of the bus. At one point, she zooms in on the driver who turns his head away and carries on beeping the horn.
The girl can be heard starting to cry when she says: 'Just open the door. Why?'
A tearful young girl was refused permission to board the last bus home from Beverley bus station, East Yorkshire, on Sunday night after the driver refused to open the doors due to 'health and safety reasons'
A police officer, who witnessed the standoff while attending another incident at the station, eventually came over to intervene and offered the teenager a lift home
A moment later, a female police officer is seen walking towards the front of the bus and asks the teenage girl what is happening.
'He won't let me on the bus', says the teary young girl.
The police officer asks her where she is going back to and she responds: 'Dunswell, but he won't let me on the bus.'
Asked why not, she says she does not know, adding: 'I just missed it by a second so I ran up and he won't let me on.'
The police officer then walks round to the side window to question the bus driver, who says: 'I'm not allowed to open the doors, I'm not allowed to.'
When asked why, he says: 'Because it's health and safety, I'm not allowed.
'She is an adult as far as I'm concerned and I am late.'
The girl tells the police officer she is 15, before she is offered a lift home by the PC.
She tells the driver: 'I think there's nothing around you, she could have got on the bus.'
To which the driver responds: 'Just as your job is to follow instructions, so is mine.
'I'm sorry. Sorry.'
The driver beeps his horn a few more times but the girl remains in front of the bus. At one point, she zooms in on the driver who turns his head away and carries on beeping the horn
The girl's father, Gary Hockney, told Hull Daily Mail: 'She was so upset. It happened on Sunday night and on Monday she didn't go to college.
'She was frightened to go on the bus because she goes on a public bus and she was worried that she would bump into this driver.
'She came back on Monday and she was in tears about it and explained that was why.'
The teenager was trying to board the bus at 9.30pm on Sunday.
She claimed that as she reached the bus, it began to pull away. She decided to stand in front of the bus, while it was in the parking bay, so she was visible to the driver.
Mr Hockney added: 'In her words, which isn't wrong going by the footage, the bus was still in the parking bay and as she approached it, it began to pull away.
'She was directly in front of the doors and in full view of the driver. He looked at her, he saw her and carried on pulling out.
'She started crying at one point and he's revving his engine, flashing his lights, beeping his horn and then fortunately a police officer in the station at the time came over and asked what was going on.
'If you look at the footage, she challenged the driver and he just referred to this blunt health and safety policy.'
The girl's father, Gary Hockney, praised the actions of the police officer who confronted the bus driver and questioned why he wasn't allowing her to board the bus
Mr Hockney said he wanted to draw attention to the driver's actions but also to praised the police officer who assisted his daughter.
'It's such a positive thing that she did', he said.
'I would have picked her up but it was such a nice gesture.
'Having thought about it, it might be that the bus company doesn't allow that sort of discretion, which is stupid. They should give their employees the confidence to make those decisions.
'I'm sure he would have let his own daughter on in that situation or if he saw somebody being chased or something surely at some point there's a cut off and you show some discretion.'
A spokeswoman for East Yorkshire Buses said: 'On Sunday night one of our buses was in the process of leaving Beverley Bus Station at its scheduled departure time when a late arriving passenger ran out in front of it to try to stop it leaving.
'For safety reasons, our drivers are advised not to allow any more passengers to board once they have closed the doors and reversed off the bus station stands, as it is unsafe for passengers to try to enter the part of the station where buses are moving.
'The passenger refused to move from in front of the bus, so a police officer who was in the station dealing with some antisocial behaviour came to speak to the driver, and agreed to give the passenger a lift home so that the bus could continue on its way.
'Our driver was satisfied that the passenger was safe, and the bus was able to continue with its journey. We’d advise that passengers always ensure they arrive at their bus stop in good time, and we have live tracking features on our website and app which you can use to ensure you never miss a bus.'
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