Colombo, Feb 1 (Daily Mirror) - The internal committee of the All Ceylon Inter-Provincial School Children Transport Services Association has decided to take a collective decision to increase the school children's transport fares from today, Associations chairman E.H. Ruwan Prasad said.

He told the media that 10% of the existing transport fare will be increased for short-distance school services and 15% will be increased for long-distance school services.

"Therefore, the association requests the government to give a firm decision before implementing the new transport fares. With the increase in the fare, parents always have to suffer. We cannot stay silent with this fuel price increase. We can increase the school van transport fares along with the government's decision to increase fuel prices, but it is unfortunate to say that there is no procedure introduced by the government to reduce the prices," Prasad said.

"Therefore, if the Minister is unable to maintain a fixed price for fuel, he should resign. These results are the adverse results of the VAT. All spare parts, lubricants and service charges have been increased with the imposition of the VAT," he said.