Meeting on Secondary school in Brixton

[lang rabbie]

Unfortunately, SSCIL are at the forefront of putting out the very misleading message that the council could 'reinvest' the money from the sale of Norwood Park School to buy the Thames Water site.

Lang Rabbie is absolutely right to say that the money from that sale is needed to balance the books on the whole Primary School Development Strategy . SSCIL are well aware of this fact and I am puzzled that they continue to tell parents otherwise.

My point was confined to the proceeds of the earlier sales of Brixton primary schools, which SSCIL had claimed were somehow "owed" to Brixton. I said nothing about the Norwood Park sale, which will finally come up within the period of a capital investment strategy set by the current administration.

I am concerned that nowhere on the Lambeth website can I find a report of the scrutiny of the Primary School Development Strategy promised in the earlier press cutting that I put up. What are the final figures for both cost of the new schools and asset sales realised?

There seems to be too much rhetoric and too few facts from both SSCIL and the council.

 

[hendo]

There's too few facts on here as well.

Anyone care to favour us with a "New Readers Start Here" post on Lambeth's proposed secondary school?

 

[Mr BC]

There's too few facts on here as well.

Anyone care to favour us with a "New Readers Start Here" post on Lambeth's proposed secondary school?

Don't worry your pretty little head dear. Just listen to what that nice Cllr Bottrall has to say.

 

[Mrs Magpie]

hendo, this may be useful...it's the Parents campaign group for a school in Lambeth.....I believe one of the Mums involved helped run Walter Mondale's campaign....
www.sscil.org.uk/whyschool/sscilcase1.html

 

[hendo]

That's a good site, tks Mrs M.

 

[Gramsci]

Unfortunately, SSCIL are at the forefront of putting out the very misleading message that the council could 'reinvest' the money from the sale of Norwood Park School to buy the Thames Water site. Lang Rabbie is absolutely right to say that the money from that sale is needed to balance the books on the whole Primary School Development Strategy (you have to hand it to new Labour for dreaming up such a catchy Orwellian title for a plan to close schools). SSCIL are well aware of this fact and I am puzzled that they continue to tell parents otherwise.

I have also had a rush of parents at my surgery telling me that the council wanted to build a new Brixton secondary school in an area 'awash with drug dealers and criminals' i.e. Somerleyton Road. The argument then runs that the council should build any new school on the Thames Water site on Brixton Hill. Am I alone in thinking it extremely unhelpful that SSCIL seeks to denigrate East Brixton in this way as part of its campaign to get a school in what is, undeniably, a much more middle class part of Brixton?

I did tell the SSCIL at the time that using the crime argument would be a mistake.Im not in SSCIL but I have regular contact with them.I did forsee that it would undermine their argument and I have been proved correct.As its the common argument used against them by the Council.Oh well.I do question whether the Thame Water site is a more middle class area.Their are Council properties nearby.Some of the nearby streets are a mixture of HA and private owners-I now as Ive been up their.

I think people are missing the point about the money arguement.Its more IMO to show how crazy is the funding of education.Schools get closed and sites sold then Lambeth is in a situation that it does not have enough school places.Does not make a lot of sense.After all the sale of sites was supposed to fund and modernise the schools in Lambeth not just balance the books.

Still this is also about what central Government does as well.If a Labour Council had been in power now I wonder if Central Government would have bailed them out and provided extra money to buy new sites?Call me cynical but its not in their interest to see a LibDem Tory Council continue.

 

[Gramsci]

Don't worry your pretty little head dear. Just listen to what that nice Cllr Bottrall has to say.

I bet he wishes all those parents would as well

 

[pooka]

Bottrall has a letter in this week's SLP - which is ambiguous around the Brixton Hill site, to say the least. Are they investigating it?

 

[Gramsci]

There's too few facts on here as well.

Anyone care to favour us with a "New Readers Start Here" post on Lambeth's proposed secondary school?

Also discussed here as well:

http://www.urban75.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=54578&highlight=secondary+school+brixton



Edited on 5/6/2004 to get link to work.

 

[Mrs Magpie]

The local residents near Somerleyton were dead against the Somerleyton Site because
a) Metropolitan Housing Trust already have some plan for the area that local people were keen on.
b) The Training Centre for adults with Learning Disabilities would be adversely affected.
c) The crossroads of Coldharbour Lane and Atlantic Road is already far too dangerous without loads of schoolchildren too.
d) Poorer transport links (only the P5) compared to the other possible sites.
e) The Somerleyton Site is about half the acreage recommended for a school.
f) It is too near the Eurostar line and really noisy.
g) There are two far better possible sites ie Thames Water and Shakespeare Road.



Footnote;
The Moorlands Tenants Association 'leader' who is, it's fair to say is controversial went and told Cllr Bottrall that all the Moorlands Tenants wanted the school there, when in fact, that was most definitely NOT the case, although they hadn't been consulted about it anyway........I don't believe anyone on the Tenants Association had either.

 

[Gramsci]

Bottrall has a letter in this week's SLP - which is ambiguous around the Brixton Hill site, to say the least. Are they investigating it?

The Council does not own the Brixton Hill site.The Shakespeare Rd site is the third possible site.The Brixton Area Committee resolved on 4/5/2004 that,

"BAC notes that issues relating to the acquisition funding and sponsorship potential of various possible sites for the proposed City Academies in Brixton have become much clearer in recent weeks,and that the Shakespeare Rd site now seems to be in the best position to proceed in the immediate future.Issues of funding and sponsorship for this site will be easier to resolve in the short term than those for the other potential sites.

BAC notes that remaining issues of the Shakespeare Rd site are within the Councils power and responsibility to resolve,and urges all concerned to move this process forward as quickly as possible that the Academy can begin.That the LBL provide a precise timeline on the issues and decisions required to use all or part of the Shakespeare Rd site and that the Executive acknowledge that the windfall of approximately £27m should be used to fill in the financial gap for the Brixton City Academy."

The SSCIL and their offshoot the Nelson Mandela Foundation have been pushing the Thames Water site.Check their websites for more details(linked earlier in this thread).

Basically the Nelason Mandela Foundation is putting in its own proposals for a City Academy.It has found a sponsor for the Depot and Brixton Hill sites but SSCILs say(if ive got this right) that the sponsor(s) could walk away if the Somerleyton Rd site is chosen.

 

[Mrs Magpie]

SSCILs say(if ive got this right) that the sponsor(s) could walk away if the Somerleyton Rd site is chosen.

I understand this to be true...but, like Gramsci, I'm not sure...I wasn't there but I was told that some parents (don't know if they were SSCIL, or just independent concerned Moorlands parents) met with one of the sponsors and outlined the different sites with an aerial photograph showing how unsuitable the Somerleyton site was compared to the other two sites...I believe he met them them in a tenants house on the Moorlands and saw for himself how unsuitable the Somerleyton site was........

 

[Chrysanthemum]

Investment in kids, weird idea, right?

Lambeth Council don't provide schools for the kids who live here (a MAJORITY of Lambeth kids HAVE to leave the borough for secondary school, partly because so many school places are for girls and christians, and partly because there are nowhere near enough places), they force local people to work like dogs to do the Council's job of getting the schools local children need, they don't provide any information or advice or ideas without having their arms twisted behind their backs, then they have the brass to say that the amateurs, the volunteers, are putting out a "misleading message"?! And where exactly IS this misleading message? I know Lambeth doesn't usually bother its pretty head with the concept of INVESTMENT, but the rest of the world doesn't inhabit their parallel universe. It is not wrong or misleading to conclude that Lambeth, desperately short of schools, should invest money in schools. What's insane is wasting so much time blaming the past, the public, kids, or their parents, for this situation. Lambeth Council needs to focus on fixing the problem, not complaining. And where are their solutions?

Also, I'd like to know when the Council announced that only certain kids would get the chance to go to a local secondary school. Who decided that schools weren't a right, for every child? And who did the maths that show all the kids in Brixton (and Herne Hill too) fitting into one school (this is what Lambeth says is OK)? A normal sized school takes 180 kids into Year 7 every year, and there are many more kids than that in Brixton. SSCIL (that terrible scary group that seems to have replaced Marxist revolutionaries in Lambeth Council's mind) says there are 600 kids leaving Year 6 every year in Brixton and Herne Hill. How does Lambeth expect to cram them into the pathetic scrap of land they've tossed up on Somerleyton Road?? I wish I believed that their stupid digs at the middle classes flourishing in the shadow of Brixton Prison (which is where this middle class school to serve the middle classes would go) showed genuine concern for the kids who suffer most under the Lambeth regime, the kids who are POOR. But I don't believe it for a minute. They haven't shown that they want to provide for these kids. Instead, they've tried to set desperate and generally well-meaning people against each other, and I think they should be ashamed of themselves. But how do you shame an old slapper like Lambeth Council?

I think they are hoping that Brixton will just get kicked around like usual, and that we'll all just take it. Not without a fight, we won't. I won't anyway.

Unfortunately, SSCIL are at the forefront of putting out the very misleading message that the council could 'reinvest' the money from the sale of Norwood Park School to buy the Thames Water site. Lang Rabbie is absolutely right to say that the money from that sale is needed to balance the books on the whole Primary School Development Strategy (you have to hand it to new Labour for dreaming up such a catchy Orwellian title for a plan to close schools). SSCIL are well aware of this fact and I am puzzled that they continue to tell parents otherwise.

I have also had a rush of parents at my surgery telling me that the council wanted to build a new Brixton secondary school in an area 'awash with drug dealers and criminals' i.e. Somerleyton Road. The argument then runs that the council should build any new school on the Thames Water site on Brixton Hill. Am I alone in thinking it extremely unhelpful that SSCIL seeks to denigrate East Brixton in this way as part of its campaign to get a school in what is, undeniably, a much more middle class part of Brixton?

 

[Chrysanthemum]

check this out too

This website is good too www.mandelaschool.org.uk
you can look at the facts and decide yourself

Also discussed here as well:

http://www.urban75.net/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=545788&highlight=secondary+school+brixton

cant get link to work but if you put New secondary school in Brixton into Search it comes up.

 

[lang rabbie]

I personally think that the Somerleyton Road site has real problems, not least the very real concerns for kids being funnelled through areas where there is still street dealing in hard drugs, which current legislation and law enforcement seems unlikely to resolve before the school opens.

BUT... Playing devil's advocate - if I were a Lambeth education officer, I would be briefing Cllr Bottrall that many of the other objections have no more crediblity than those of the nimbies in £1million houses in Elms Road, Clapham who didn't want the Clapham Academy at the end of their back gardens.

"a) Metropolitan Housing Trust already have some plan for the area that local people were keen on."

- why should existing residents have such a veto?

b) The Training Centre for adults with Learning Disabilities would be adversely affected.

- what does "adversely affected" mean? It would be a lot easier to find alternative accommodation for the Centre than it will be to relocate the dustcarts from Shakespeare Road - unless these come to Somerleyton Road.

c) The crossroads of Coldharbour Lane and Atlantic Road is already far too dangerous without loads of schoolchildren too.

- safety improvements could be funded by a Section 106 (planning gain) agreement from the development and would be a legitimate part of the school budget.

d) Poorer transport links (only the P5) compared to the other possible sites.

Poorer transport links from where? - surely SSCIL want a community school for Brixton, and all national government strategies are encouraging children to walk to school where possible. Bus services are subject to regular review, and this can be resolved before the school opens

e) The Somerleyton Site is about half the acreage recommended for a school.

- none of the sites being offered in Lambeth will meet the full recommended acreage.

f) It is too near the Eurostar line and really noisy.

- can be resolved by high standards of environmental design/e.g. triple glazing on the north east wall facing the railway. If it is this bad, why do locals consider it to be an acceptable site for social housing?

g) There are two far better possible sites ie Thames Water and Shakespeare Road.

- one with major operational questions about ongoing access to the covered reservoirs, no agreement for sale/site assembly with adjoining land owners; one only partly in Council ownership, and with major constraints on where to move the depot to, as against a site in Council ownership.

Edited to add: Please feel free to destroy these arguments - I personally think that the one on space is probably campaigners strongest card, as I can't see that you could get anything on site without completely inadequate playground provision.

 

[Mrs Magpie]

"a) Metropolitan Housing Trust already have some plan for the area that local people were keen on."

- why should existing residents have such a veto?

Because residents are mightily pissed off at continuously engaging in expensive consultations, putting loads of time and effort and then the plans get scrapped. It's creating loads of apathy and cynicsm about the cost of all these consultations, time put in by residents, plans announced, then they're scrapped or quietly shelved.

b) The Training Centre for adults with Learning Disabilities would be adversely affected.

- what does "adversely affected" mean? It would be a lot easier to find alternative accommodation for the Centre than it will be to relocate the dustcarts from Shakespeare Road - unless these come to Somerleyton Road.

They don't want to move. They're happy about having improvements to the present site and are settled there. People with learning disabilities, especially people with Autism often find change devastating and extremely hard to adapt to......they tend not to feature on the rest of the publics radar, are rarely consulted and are often just shunted around and kept out of the picture.

c) The crossroads of Coldharbour Lane and Atlantic Road is already far too dangerous without loads of schoolchildren too.

- safety improvements could be funded by a Section 106 (planning gain) agreement from the development and would be a legitimate part of the school budget.

What, knock down the Viaduct and widen a very narrow pavement at the expense of a narrow road? I'm no engineer, but I fail to see how this junction can be improved....

d) Poorer transport links (only the P5) compared to the other possible sites.

Poorer transport links from where? - surely SSCIL want a community school for Brixton, and all national government strategies are encouraging children to walk to school where possible. Bus services are subject to regular review, and this can be resolved before the school opens

There are more buses to a wider variety of destinations at the other sites, particularly Brixton Hill. Granted this could be improved, but it seems to me it makes sense to look at the existing transport as part of the criteria for choosing a site.

e) The Somerleyton Site is about half the acreage recommended for a school.

- none of the sites being offered in Lambeth will meet the full recommended acreage.

The Somerleyton site is much smaller than the other two sites....can't remember the exact acreage of the other two, but I know the Somerleyton site is by far the smallest.

f) It is too near the Eurostar line and really noisy.

- can be resolved by high standards of environmental design/e.g. triple glazing on the north east wall facing the railway. If it is this bad, why do locals consider it to be an acceptable site for social housing?

The Somerleyton Site would have to be slap bang next to the line. At least the residents have buildings and large trees between them and the line which cuts a lot of the noise. Also triple glazing? The sun beating into classrooms where you can't open the windows, and need to be able to concentrate...so you sweat away or are deafened....no thanks. I would want better than that for my kids.

g) There are two far better possible sites ie Thames Water and Shakespeare Road.

- one with major operational questions about ongoing access to the covered reservoirs, no agreement for sale/site assembly with adjoining land owners; one only partly in Council ownership, and with major constraints on where to move the depot to, as against a site in Council ownership.

Better sites from the point of view of the children who will be learning there, rather than better for the bureaucrats........

 

[hendo]

Does anyone know when a decision might be taken and building work actually start?

 

[Chrysanthemum]

Where are the facts?

I was going to reply but Mrs Magpie beat me to it. The other sites, the Brixton Hill/Thames WAter one, and the Shakespeare Road site, are both bigger and better than the tiny one the Council is trying to shove down our throats. I agreed with all her points, and would add that it's a lot easier and more humane to move rubbish trucks than people with learning disabilities. Depots are easier to move than just about anything else you can think of, and there's no reason for a rubbish truck depot to be right in the centre of Brixton. That site on Shakespeare Road should be given to kids and the community. Also, the site on Brixton Hill doesn't have any problems except that the Council doesn't want to spend any money on Brixton children. It's not even expensive, but Lambeth doesn't want to put any money into Brixton. I got a Lib Dem election thing through my door talking about schools for Norwood and even Streatham, congratulating themselves on the Clapham school--and saying nothing serious about Brixton.
And also, at the Brixton Area Committee the Council officer said that three sponsors had turned down the Council's crummy site--so it's not just us locals who think it isn't good enough.
Everyone should come to the demo at the Town Hall on the 14th at 6:30. That's when they can set aside some money to buy school sites in Brixton--or tell us that Brixton doesn't matter.

 

[Mrs Magpie]

I was going to reply but Mrs Magpie beat me to it.

It was rather a rushed reply...I was expecting people round and hadn't started cooking
I'm not actually really involved with the campaign, but some neighbours are. I'm sure they have far more to add than I have...they don't have computers though.....

 

[Gramsci]

Does anyone know when a decision might be taken and building work actually start?

A decision may may be taken at the Council Executive meeting on 14th June-which is why SSCIL are calling a demo.Seeearlier posts as well.

 

[Gramsci]

Bottrall has a letter in this week's SLP - which is ambiguous around the Brixton Hill site, to say the least. Are they investigating it?

I saw this letter-in reply to the letters from parents in the previous week.Its from Bottrall so I assume its the Administration views.A few points:

1)He talks of a school for West Norwood and Brixton with the "possibility" of a third.He also says the W Norwood site is supported by "another" parents group.At the end of the letter he says that the Councils "larger duty is to parents and children in all parts of the borough".

Seems to me that this means that Brixton will in reality only get one school-on Somerleyton Rd.Also I loath the way the Council try and play off residents against each other.The implication of his comments are that those campaigning for schools in Brixton are doing so to the detriment of other parents in different parts of Lambeth.Divide and Rule-and old Council tactic.No wonder people get cynical about politicians.

2)He also says that the Somerleyton Rd site is "available"-as Mrs Magpie has pointed out its occupied.Ive seen no officers reports or comments by the Council about how they are going to make it "readily available".

3)He also states that they are doing a study of the Shakespeare Rd site and Brixton hill sites-no one appears to have seen these yet.Ive a suspicion they may decide on the Somerleyton Rd site and quietly drop these studies or produce a report saying they were not feasible after the decision has been taken.

 

[Gramsci]

. SSCIL (that terrible scary group that seems to have replaced Marxist revolutionaries in Lambeth Council's mind)

I would take that as a compliment Chrysanthemum

 

[Gramsci]

"a) Metropolitan Housing Trust already have some plan for the area that local people were keen on."

- why should existing residents have such a veto?


- can be resolved by high standards of environmental design/e.g. triple glazing on the north east wall facing the railway. If it is this bad, why do locals consider it to be an acceptable site for social housing?

.

I agree with Mrs Magpie on this.Its not a matter on existing residents having a veto.Its a matter of them having any say in the matter at all.As I live on the site I have been involved in the original MHT proposals for the site.I received a phone call one night asking me if I knew that the Council were thinking of building a school on the site.I did not know anything about it.I got in touch with MHT.They had been told by the Council to shelve their proposals.MHT therefore had decided to put no more time and money into it.It was clear to me that MHT had been told not to tell anyone yet about this.Ive got no problem with MHT-i can understand their position.

It was clear to me that the Council were doing this without consulting residents or parents in the area.The "consultation" only started after it had leaked out.Clearly the Council wanted to decide this behind closed doors.If it wasnt for SSCIL their would have been no discussion at all.The Council might have put it through the Neighbourhood forums-but they are basically Council organisations.The council can brief the Town Centre Mge to say the right things to get it passed by the Forums.

Why should existing residents have a veto?This is were decentralisation of Council decision making falls down.Both Lib/Dems and Labour support decentralisation.I actually remember when Labour brought in Forums the Lib/Dems criticising Labour for not giving the Forums more decision making powers.If you are not going to genuinely consult and give local people a say then dont give them the impression they have one.Dont set up Area committees or Neighbourhood Forums.The present situation is one where the Council Administration choose to consult or not as it suits them.Take the Area Committees-a Lib/Dem idea.Their have been complaints from the BAC that the Executive dont take the Area Committees seriously.As the Brixton one is Labour dominated the Admin(Lib/Dem Tory) dont like it.

The Council has given people the impression they have a say.It the Council who should be asked why they havent.Not why should residents have a veto.

The MHT proposals were not just for social housing(affordable housing in the present jargon).It was going to be a mixed use site.Also community facilites and workshop units(in line with Creative and Cultural industries).I think it would have been possible to do this mixture on the site.

 

[Gramsci]

g) There are two far better possible sites ie Thames Water and Shakespeare Road.

- one with major operational questions about ongoing access to the covered reservoirs, no agreement for sale/site assembly with adjoining land owners; one only partly in Council ownership, and with major constraints on where to move the depot to, as against a site in Council ownership.

Edited to add: Please feel free to destroy these arguments - I personally think that the one on space is probably campaigners strongest card, as I can't see that you could get anything on site without completely inadequate playground provision.

I agree the space argument is one of the strongest.From an officers report to BAC:

"The Somerleyton Rd Site is currently occupied and is of a size and shape that makes the designing of an Academy solution challenging.Such a solution would need to recognise that the exterior play space that could be created would be limited.This however is not an insurmountable problem as other open space is within easy reach,as are the Brixton Recreation Centre and Ferndale Sports Centre.A large proportion of inner city secondary face similar problems yet operate sucessfully."

I notice the officer does not state where this open space is-Brockwell park?The officer is basically saying that their will be no playground space.The school would be just a basic one.Not I thought what a City Academy was supposed to be-i thought they were supposed to be Flagships of a new type of school.A large number of secondary schools face the same problem as playing fields have been sold off as well as school closures and sales of sites in recent years.

The officer also says that it would be a design challenge.Ive seen no evidence of how this design challenge will be surmounted.

The use of Brixton Rec may be feasible as its nearby.But has the Rec been consulted about this and how they will cope?I think not.Ferndale is not that near IMO-its quite a long walk.

The officer also notes the site is occupied but does not give any info on how this will be dealt with.It contradicts Bottrals letter to SLP arguing the site is readily available.

I quote from the same report:

"The creation of an Academy is fundamentally different from the creation of a LEA maintained school.In almost all cases an Academy arises where a school currently exists but has deemed to have failed.Then an Academy is proposed and the school rebuilt and/or resited.In this instance there is no pre-existing school.Once it is determined that an Academy is to be built then the Council does not have a majority say in what happens(except for planning related issues).The process is taken forward by the Academies Unit of the Department for Education and Skills(DfES).They undertake the relevant consultation."

I take it from this that the Council would have to hand over a vacant site.It will be interesting to see how this will be done.

 

[Ol Nick]

Lambeth Council don't provide schools for the kids who live here (a MAJORITY of Lambeth kids HAVE to leave the borough for secondary school, partly because so many school places are for girls and christians

If anyone knows the progressive argument for state-funded sexist and sectarian education I'd love to hear it. These schools should be obliged to accept pupils based on the same criteria as everyone else. It's divisive and it's sick that they get away with this.

 

[Ol Nick]

Parents told to 'buy own school'

Enough of my rant. Here's a rant from the Guardian. (Not too surprising perhaps, since one of their columnists is involved with SSCIL.)


Parents told to 'buy own school'

Ministers refuse funding in area with no secondary education

 

[Anna Key]

Could someone please explain what’s going on politically here? It’s blindingly obvious that the Somerleyton Road site is unsuitable for a school:

- too small
- bang next to a railway track
- a training centre for adults with learning disabilities would need to be moved
- dangerous roads nearby
- poor transport links
- existing plans for the site

So why is the Council considering - or pretending to consider - an unsuitable site for a Brixton secondary school? What’s their game? There must be some hidden political fight being played out or this wouldn’t be happening.

What is it? Why have Brixton youth and Brixton parents been deployed by the politicians as political cannon fodder?

Brixton will be hated in some Lib-Dem/Tory circles for voting Labour - the socialist swine! - so are Brixton people being punished by the Lib-Dem/Tory administration for their leftist tendencies?

Is the Somerleyton Road site a stick with which to beat Brixton parents and children? To punish the adults for voting Labour, to encourage the children to avoid the sins of their fathers?

But how exactly is it in local LibDem/Tory interests to set up a straw man, in the form of the unsuitable Somerleyton Road site, only for it to be knocked down? Or did they really believe they could fob off Labour Brixton with a school on a cramped site by a railway track? Do they really believe Brixton people to be that stupid?

Or did they say privately:

Oh Brixton is just a bunch of feckless Proles and doped-up hippies who’ll accept any old crap. Look how we’ve foisted an “entertainments hub” (translation: “drugs-tourism centre for Clapham Yupps”) on the idiots with hardly a complaint!

Let’s just give them a cheap, cramped, rubbish school by a railway track and spend the bulk of the money in nice middle-class, sensible, right-thinking, right-voting areas. That’s politics, after all: you reward your friends and punish your enemies.

Is that the answer? Brixton people were stupid enough not to vote Lib Dem or Tory so - the political argument runs - will be stupid enough to accept a cramped, second rate school by a railway track. And they deserve it, as punishment for voting Labour. Teach the Proles and hippies a political lesson! Give them a slap to encourage improved voting habits in the future!

So perhaps the Somerleyton Road site isn’t a straw man. Perhaps some in the Council really thought it was good enough for Brixton. But then got rumbled by the Secondary Schools/Nelson Mandela campaign.

Which explains why “that terrible scary group that seems to have replaced Marxist revolutionaries in Lambeth Council's mind” - thank you Chrysanthemum - is disliked. They caught the Council with its political trousers down. LOL!

And the parents' group has political nous. To use the name ‘Nelson Mandela’ in their campaign (with the old boy’s permission) is a stroke of genius. What - overwhelmingly white - Lambeth politician will pick a fight with the aging Robin Island Martyr?

The Lib-Dems/Tories wanted to screw Brixton with a second rate school (while quietly building decent schools in Lib-Dem/Tory areas to reward their voters) and got caught by “Marxist revolutionaries” in the SSCIL/Mandela Campaign. LOL!

Is that the drama being enacted? If not, please can someone explain the plot behind this political opera, directed by politicians, and featuring Brixton youth and Brixton parents as chorus line?

Note that Cllr Bottrall is still pressing for Somerleyton Road and pouring cold water on more suitable sites. From his 28th May 2004 letter in the SLP:

The Department for Education and Skills has agreed that the site, in Somerleyton Road, is suitable for a secondary school but needs to find a private sponsor before it will fund it. The two sites favoured by the Nelson Mandela campaign group are much less readily available.

I think it’s a mistake to play politics with Brixton youth and parents. People become excited when their children are abused. I suspect the Council may now quietly shelve Somerleyton Road and even provide Brixton with a decent secondary school.

What a radical idea! A modern, well-equipped, well run, adequately funded secondary school for Brixton built on a suitable site.

Whatever will Brixtonians demand next? Hot running water?

 

[Anna Key]

Enough of my rant. Here's a rant from the Guardian. (Not too surprising perhaps, since one of their columnists is involved with SSCIL.)


Parents told to 'buy own school'

Ministers refuse funding in area with no secondary education

Here's another rant from the BBC website:

Parents are threatening to withhold taxes in an effort to get government funding for a new secondary school.

Devon Alison and the campaign got a mention by Libby Purves on Radio 4 yesterday afternoon (Learning Curve: 16.30-17.00) inviting Lambeth Parents without a local secondary school to email in their views.

The next programme is Sunday 23:00-23:30 so maybe they'll be mentioned then.

 

[Brixton Hatter]

There's also an article in the Evening (sub) Standard here

Essentially the argument is this: the Govt will provide up to £10m for a new school (city academy) if a) a private sponsor will put £2m in, and b) Lambeth Council can supply a site.

Clearly, no private sponsor will put £2m into the Somerleyton Road. It's a shit site. The other two sites (the dustbin depot on Shakespeare Road and the water works on Brixton Hill) would deprive the council of vital service space and I guess it would cost them money to replace them. Is it that the council is not willing to put the cash up to make these sites available? Or they can't afford to cos they short-sightedly spanked all the Dick Shepherd etc cash on primary schools.

As previously mentioned, one other suitable site is Brixton Prison. The Home Office are considering closing it. I wrote to Blunkett some months ago to suggest using it for a school, but he still hasn't replied so I have written to him again today. Interestingly, I also wrote to the DfES a few months ago and they said they were interested to hear of progress re: the Prison site.

Still, should we be building a city academy anyway, with it's selective policies and private investment? What's wrong with a comprehensive?

 

[Minnie_the_Minx]

Brixton Hatter - have you absolutely NO consideration for us Brixton Hill residents. As if we want a load of scallies on our doorstep