Dear Rt Hon Chris Skidmore, Rt Hon Luke Hall, and Rt Hon Nadim Zahawi

It has been announced today that there will be longer delays to the opening of Lyde Green Secondary School. This will place schools within Lyde Green’s APR into a crisis point. Roughly 90 pupils will be leaving Lyde Green Primary school and going into Year 7. Secondary schools within the APR of Lyde Green Primary School will now have to find places to support these children. South Gloucestershire Council’s Commissioning of School Places Strategy 2018-2022 highlights that for this school year there will be a deficit of 129 school places.

PAN’s
Mangotsfield – 240 (planned deficit of 34)
Winterbourne – 300 (Planned deficit of 44)
Downend – 210 but increased to 240 because of demand (Planned deficit of 32)
Kings Oak – 75 (150) places as they are a through school and will take from their linked primary school. (Planned deficit of 19)

Total of 930 places within Lyde Green’s APR, however Winterbourne International Academy falls into 2 APRs and children from Lyde Green are not in it’s priority APR. Downend is similar in that it will always look to take children within it’s local area i.e. Stanbridge Primary. What is clear is that once again children within Lyde Green are not a priority and that these revelations cannot be new. To give parents such a short amount of time to re-consider their choices is completely unacceptable. What is also unacceptable is the amount of time it took the department for education to allocate funding for the development of a secondary school, had this funding be allocated sooner problems within the building development would not have affected the residents of Lyde Green. A development of 2,500 properties and 6 years on still no secondary school provision despite the desperate school places situation. It was announced back in August that the building would not be ready and that temporary buildings would have to support the students at Winterbourne Academy, but to tell parents this will not be happening now is not fair. It questions the Government’s and Council’s commitment to education and highlights the funding issues of free schools.

As a Government, education should be a priority, after all, young minds of this Country are the future. This is not an isolated incident in South Gloucestershire, there have been persistent funding issues across the County and this has caused challenges.

There are definitely some questions that require answers;
• When were South Gloucestershire Council made aware the development was in trouble?
• Why was the SGS through school scrapped and replaced by Olympus and C-SET?
• How will South Gloucestershire Council support parents and children without their first choice at this short notice, will SGC grant an extension on choices?
• Will the new primary school’s opening be delayed as well?