It is with a sardonic irony that
the Adver reports that Tadpole Farm will become the preferred site for a four-form-entry
primary school in Priory Vale. The
council has been aware of the demand for school places for several years and
funding provision had been made to meet the known demand. However, it carried out the following incomprehensible
actions:
- It was clear from the building programme that two-form-entry schools were needed, yet it continued to provide one-form-entry schools.
- This was coincidental in so far as Cllr Renard sat on a schools task group which carved up safety valve money for North Swindon schools and set out to build schools in South Swindon when there was already sufficient capacity. In doing this, schools in the North were starved of building funds and new school places.
- Parents
of children in Priory Vale have been treated in a cruel manner and now
find their children shunted around the Northern part of Swindon for no
other reason other than political incompetence and muddled thinking.
- All
of this is done without effective scrutiny and accountability; but the
solution from the self-same-councillors was to build on Mouldon Hill
Country Park. This was a site the
council knew was inaccessible, had overhead power cables and many other
difficulties.
- The
people of Oakhurst showed a preference not to build on Mouldon Hill and to
bring forward the school at Tadpole Farm. People in Oakhurst clearly
expressed a view and a preference and Cllr Renard’s response to this is
that it is “from a financial point of view disappointing we had to choose that
site”.
- Surely
it is not a disappointment that a Country Park has been saved from
development? Surely it is not a disappointment that local people will be
able to get their children into a local school?
- Surely
it is not disappointment to the parents that have to transport children to
West Swindon?
- Surely
Cllr Renard is elected, first and foremost, to represent the residents of
North Swindon, as he is a councillor in Haydon Wick. This is part of the Northern Sector
school place area.
- Councillors
who attempt to blame the residents for the premature spending of £3m
building a road that will be refunded, is political clap trap of the worse
kind. Blaming council tax payers
for having an input into how their money is spent is a scandal.
- It is outrageous that councillors are so out of touch with people that they attempt to pull the wool over their eyes and blame them for taking part in a Borough consultation.
10. What it
puts one in mind of is Mr Bumble in the workhouse who tells a young Oliver
Twist, “Never before has a boy wanted more!”
