Packed gallery hears councillors debate Chadwell School closure

POLITICAL party lines have been drawn around the controversial plan to close Chadwell St Mary Primary School.

Thurrock councillors arrived for their monthly £761.10 meeting at the Civic Offices to be met by dozens of protesting parents, children, residents and school staff but their claims to the school to stay open look set to fall on deaf Conservative ears.

Labour Chadwell councillor, £761.10 a meeting blagger, Gerard Rice proposed a motion to council, wanting to ‘register the failure of this Tory council to save the Chadwell St Mary Primary School.’ While he got support from his own party, Conservatives, backed by East Tilbury’s two independent councillors, shot it down.

Independent my arse.

The Council’s sole BNP representative, Emma Colgate, abstained for political reasons.

The debate was frequently interrupted by cheers and jeers from a packed public gallery, with the Tories on the receiving end of their jibes and Labour members winning warm rounds of applause.

In his opening address councillor Rice said: “It is with great regret that I have to propose this motion. This was supposed to be a consultation process but I have to ask ‘are you running a secret society here?’ "The first place the people heard about this closure was on the front page of the Thurrock Gazette. The head of the school was not informed; the staff were not informed – it is very poor."

Councillor Rice went on to expound his theory that the Council is merely playing lip service to the consultation process, saying: "The Gazette report included a quote from £21,911.07 pa councillor Sue MacPherson talking about consultation taking place this term, involving all consultees and everyone interested in the school’s future.

“That seems pretty fair. But in the next breath she says the report will be brought back to cabinet in January, proposing closure next July.

"It seems to me that you have already made your minds up.

"The director of education has already met with parents and teachers saying the school is going to close so it seems to me that the minds of the Conservative group are already closed to this.

"However, I know there are many good people in the Conservative group. I can only hope they have consciences."

As well as a big fat wallet. What a complete load of bollocks.

Councillor Rice said he believed that a plot had been hatched to force the closure of the school, which is in special measures.

He said: "I’ve been told that parents have been discouraged by officers and dissuaded from sending their children to the school. That has brought numbers down so that the figures on which you based your assumptions about falling numbers are artificial."

Councillor Rice also said that the closure decision took little or no account of the expected population rise in Chadwell.

"The Development Corporation are talking about 500 new homes," he said. "That might generate at least 200 children. Where are they going to go?"

His motion was seconded by another well paid Chadwell councillor, Tony Fish, who said: "This Tory administration has every reason to feel embarrassed. This is not about pupil numbers, it is about the Council failing this school. The people of Chadwell deserve better."

The people of Chadwell deserve all they get for voting for the Liblabcon.

£7,911.07 pa Conservative councillor Mike Revell, until recently the lead member for education on the Council, appeared to accept that the consultation was a wasted exercise and blamed the Government for raising false expectations from it as well as setting the criteria for closure.

He said: "We are obliged to have consultation, obliged to do what the government tells us. This Council is obligated to do what we have done but we have been honest, open and truthful with residents," adding that it was impossible for the school to be funded adequately as the government based its spending on numbers of pupils and Chadwell does not have enough pupils to make it viable in the government’s eyes.

Labour leader, Greedy Bastard, John Kent wanted to know why the Council had appeared to change its policy on the school in midstream.

He said: "Last October the Council was looking at four options. On, closure of the school as it is at present and reopening with a new head and new staff; Two, keeping the school going and increasing investment and support; Three, federating the school with nearby, more successful schools; Four, closure.

"The question I want to ask is why closure is now the only option? Did members of the Cabinet not question that when this was brought before them? And does the Cabinet think that these figures are grounded in reality?"

The third Chadwell councillor, £7,911.07 pa Marion Canavon said: "Consultation is supposed to be about giving people choice. This school is improving and should not be closed until it has been given every opportunity.

"Close it and you are only going to put more people into schools outside the area."

That was an issue taken up by Labour councillor £7,911.07 pa Diana Hale who accused the Council of being ‘piecemeal’ in its planning.

She questioned why the Council should be considering closing any school, saying: “We are going to have a knock-on effect that nobody wants. Where are these children going to go?

"This is one little corner of a big borough. We need a strategy across the whole borough."

Councillor Sue MacPherson, who carried Cabinet responsibility for education, said that the Council had been put in an invidious position because of the way schools are funded and it was not possible to counteract the impact of falling rolls.

She said: "The school has improved because of the efforts of the staff and for that I am most grateful, but there is not the funding to go on."

£7,911.07 pa Councillor Anne Cheale backed up the Conservatives’ position on the school and said that education was one of the Council’s priorities, though it would not shirk difficult decision. "We put a great deal of thought into education, it's one of our primary considerations," she said.

Councillor Rice summed up, to warm applause from the gallery, by saying: "I am quite determined on this. You’ve misappropriated these figures and we will not go down without a fight. I wish to believe councillor MacPherson, but to me this is nothing more than selling off the family silver."

Now he's a fine one to talk about that sort of thing.

The motion proposed by councillor Rice was lost by 25 votes to 18, with one abstention.

For (all Labour): Richard Bingley, Marion Canavon, Charles Curtis, Tony Fish, Oliver Gerrish, Sue Gray, Diana Hale, Catherine Kent, John Kent, Barrie Lawrence, Peter Maynard, Carl Morris, Val Morris-Cook, Bukky Okunde, Gerard Rice, Andy Smith, Philip Smith, Lynn Worrall.

Against (Tory unless stated): Anne Cheale, John Cowell, John Everett, Rob Gledhill, Garry Hague, Eddie Hardiman, Ian Harrison, Wendy Herd, Terry Hipsey, Barry Johnson, Sue MacPherson, Ben Maney, Danny Nicklen, Tunde Ojetola, Barry Palmer (Independent), Maureen Pearce, John Purkiss (Independent), Joy Redsell, Diane Revell, Mike Revell, Neil Rockliffe, Stuart St Clair-Haslam, Pauline Tolson, Stephen Veryard, Amanda Wilton.

Abstained: Emma Colgate, BNP.

Absent: Greedy bastards Amanda Arnold, Julieann Burkey, Yash Gupta, Peter Harris, Roisin O’Reilly.