Bus driver to receive award for her actions.

Rome mayor Roberto Gualtieri has praised the actions of a Roman bus driver who rescued a teenage boy being bullied by giving him refuge in her driver's cabin.

The incident occurred one morning last week. The driver, identified only as Simona, first observed the boy being bullied by a gang at a bus stop in a north-east suburb of the city.

The bullying, both verbal and physical, intensified on board the bus, according to a statement from Rome's municipal transport company ATAC.

After hoping that fellow passengers would step in to save the boy from the bullies (nobody intervened to help him), Simona decided to take matters into her own hands and stopped the bus at the next stop.

With the excuse of checking the vehicle's rear door, she went to the back of the bus and calmly invited the boy to travel with her in the driver's cabin.

The stunned bullies suddenly fell silent. Once back in the driver's seat Simona asked the boy to call his family.

"She wants to be sure that he will not suffer again when she leaves him at the terminus" - ATAC stated - "The young man's mother meets them. Shocked by what happened, she goes away with her son, exchanging a few words with our young driver. Then, in the afternoon, she contacts us on our Facebook page. She wants to thank the ATAC driver who saved her son from bullies".

Rome's mayor also wants to thank Simona, described by ATAC as the mother of a small girl and the daughter of a support teacher.

"Rome is proud of these virtuous gestures that make our city a community in solidarity and close to those who are defenceless" - Gualtieri wrote on Twitter - "We will award you in the Campidoglio for this. Brava!"