LITTLE Sophia Harding’s medical condition makes routine a prerequisite in the seven-year-old’s life.

The brave youngster suffers from cerebral palsy, a motor condition that causes physical disability in development, and hydrocephalus, water on the brain, which make the risk of her suffering a fatal stroke each day high.

From birth, the St Saviour’s Primary School pupil has baffled doctors, who said she would not live past a few days old, with her pure determination.

And each day the youngster who has a shunt in her neck to control the pressure in her brain deals with her condition by following a strict routine, including when to eat, when to take medication and when to move.

Now Lancashire County Council have issued an apology after the youngster, who has undergone 16 brain operations, was left visibly upset when her assisted transport failed to turn up to take her to school.

Eugene O’Hara, head of integrated transport services at Lancashire County Council, said: “We are sorry if the problem with this little girl’s transport caused her and her family any upset, and we will do everything we can to put it right.

“By law, we have to put all our transport contracts out to tender and it is our policy to do this every three years to ensure we are getting value for money.

“We have just finished this process for a proportion of our contracts, and this morning more than 200 new transport contracts began. The vast majority went smoothly.”

Sophia’s devoted mum Jennifer Harding hit out at county hall bosses who she said did not seem to understand the upset they caused by failing to inform the family they planned to make changes to her transport.

Health care assistant, Mrs Harding, of Brambling Drive, Bacup, said: “Sophia sat and waited for more than an hour and a half to be picked up to go school and she was really upset when it didn’t arrive.

“After making a call I eventually managed to get the county council to send someone out but it wasn’t until 10am.

“This was meant to be the first day of a new company taking on the contract. Sophia’s condition means she needs to stick to a strict routine and we have to prepare her for change.

“This would have been playing on her mind all day. She even asked me to pick her up from school which means she won’t be able to come home in her motorised wheelchair and she will be confined to the house.”

The previous company gave Sophia the same driver each day.

But the new company can not guarantee this, leaving Sophia to cope with constant change.