We need a school here now

Published: 25th March 2010

• OUR association is at the heart of the south Camden area where parents have been campaigning for a local secondary school for as long as most people can remember.
The current campaign has made more headway than any of its predecessors: it’s found a site, produced statistics demonstrating the need for a school, got Ed Balls to promise extra money to set one up, and called the council’s bluff over its claim that South Camden Community School can be expanded to provide for our children.
The letter (Choice doesn’t come into it – where is our school? March 18) vividly demonstrates the difficulty facing local children and parents – in one school, of those who did get offers, 24 of them will be scattered over 13 schools.
This has to stop.
The council sends officers to area forum meetings and specially convened meetings, and no doubt prides itself on its extensive consultation over the issue, but they don’t consult and they don’t listen. They repeat their mantras about lack of evidence of need and government requirements before any money will be released.
They try to persuade us that they are sympathetic and will meet our needs eventually. All we need to do is be patient.
It won’t be here before 2025, all we’ve got to do is resign ourselves to another 15 years of our children being scattered across this borough and its neighbours for their secondary education.
It won’t do.
We need a school here, now.
MICHAEL POUTNEY
Chair, Rugby & Harpur Residents Association, WC1