St. Cuthbert's petition

St. Cuthbert's Primary School has an online petition up and running on the 10 Downing Street website - it's here. I'd encourage people to sign it.

I know that education is entirely devolved, and that the petition to No.10 will likely be passed on, but the petition facility at Holyrood takes some time to set up and I do think that this, meantime, is a good way of registering any objection to what is being proposed.

I'll obviously post on any Holyrood petition once it's established. Unfortunately the Council doesn't have an online petition facility but I do know that St. Cuthbert's have a paper petition for the Council and are in the throes of setting up a website as well.

More to follow next week I'm sure ...

Men divorcing at 43

A general news-piece about divorce has created waves of expectation within the Really Bad Blog household :-)

As you'll see from the link to the BBC report, paragraph 5 makes it clear that apparently the average age for males to divorce is 43 ... my better half is telling me I have only a few months left to pack my bags :-(

I'm sure she's just joking??

What would you have done?

"What would you have done about the schools issue?" ... it's a question that numerous people have asked me over the last few weeks.

Of course, I'm not in charge of Education any more - the Liberals and Nationalists are, and the decisions of the last few weeks have been theirs (and no one elses!) based on evidence given to them by officers. I've not seen everything that's been given to them as they haven't included other parties in the decision-making process ... even though we offered to be so involved.

But, all that said, given how many people have asked I will try and outline here - and in accompanying links - how we may have approached what faced the Council post May 3rd, if the election result had been different. And I'll also lay out some of the history to this whole saga.

To some considerable extent, I have already touched on most of this debate ... if you go to my post of August 16th here ... you'll be able to see most of my argument, but please do 'follow back' on the links that are within that post to read the whole debate.

I also posted links to two articles (one by me, one by the new Administration) on August 21st giving the pros and cons of the proposals - that post can be found here.


HISTORY

• Previous Labour Administrations have closed schools in Edinburgh. We are not automatically opposed to the 'principle' of rationalising the school estate when there is substantial, and long-term, over-capacity in the system.
• We undertook those closures against a backdrop of significant amalgamations and new-buildings, more on that here and here.
• We did try to have as inclusive a process of consultation on these issues as possible, and certainly always heard Deputation requests ... but recognising that we didn't always succeed in getting every single aspect of consultation right, we set up a Cross Party Working Group (CPWG) as far back as October 2005 - see item 2 on the Council minute here - to try and keep as much consensus on a way forward as possible.
• Unfortunately, in October 2006, one of the political parties on the Council abandoned the CPWG. Added to this, there were considerable difficulties in the work it was considering being leaked to the press, so we decided to disband the group - see item 8 on the Council minute here. PLEASE do read the wording of this decision.
• From that moment (10th October 2006) all political work on this process ceased.
• There has subsequently NEVER been a political list for the 'next-round of closures' - such claims are simply a lie.

POST MAY 3rd

• we lost the election :-(
• mind you, we did get more 1st preference votes than any other Party and formed the second biggest group on the Council :-))
• but, the Liberals (17 Cllrs) and Nationalists (12 Cllrs) formed a coalition with 29 members, thus THEY KNEW they would have to depend on the casting vote of the Lord Provost to push through anything controversial which all the other opposition Parties - Labour (15 Cllrs), Tories (11 Cllrs), Greens (3 Cllrs) - would not support.
• I tried on two occasions (see here and here) in June 2007 to get the new Administration to reform the CPWG, and had hoped they would accept that the time was right to do just that. We made it clear we wanted to play a part in any new process of school rationalisation - maybe naively, I actually believed they would be sensible enough to want to tap into the experience of Councillors who had been through all of this on several occasions in the last few decades.
• Those approaches were rejected out of hand and NO cross-party discussion occurred on this during June, July and August.

POST MID-AUGUST

• in mid-August, the new Administration announced it plans to consult on the closure of 22 schools and 4 community centres
• we had had no involvement whatsoever in deciding what was on that list, probably more importantly neither had any of the partners that COULD have been discussing this for over 2 months as part of the CPWG ... parents, teachers, churches and unions.
• there are criteria for closing schools, and many of the criteria are simply NOT met by those establishments on the list ... I posted on this yesterday here.
• there is no new building proposed, numerous schools annexes would be created, and no over-arching vision was put forward. The case was not made.
• in addition, the SNP at a national level are committed to reducing the class sizes of P1/P2 & P3 to 18 pupils and increasing Nursery provision by a whopping 50% - none of this has been considered, meaning we could end up getting rid of over-capacity now only to have to re-introduce capacity to cope with these almost certain national changes in the very near future. It's mad!
• and, the way that Deputation requests have been dealt with has been scandalous - there's almost no need to go on about it, but see here, here and here.

MONEY

• the Administration, in public at least, have been clear that this is primarily about best use of the educational estate, and not about finance. Although, as I said above, I don't think they've made the case on educational benefit in any way, shape or form.
• there has been a serious conflating of ongoing revenue pressures within the Council, with the school closure programme - the two are separate issues. I posted on the revenue pressures as far back as June - see here.
• the Council has a near £1billion 'annual' revenue and capital budget, as well as fixed assets of over £2billion.
• there is no need to swallow hook, line and sinker the proposed 'service rationalisations' and 'property rationalisations' (cuts and closures!) that officers put forward. Sadly, that appears to be what has happened here.
• collective political choice needs to be exercised, and put simply, I don't think it has been in this process.
• given the huge Council-wide budgets mentioned above, alternatives would have been feasible, but I'm not convinced that many (if any?) alternatives were collectively discussed.

WHAT IF?

• what if we had been in charge?
• well, I must STRESS, this is obviously all hypothetical :-(
• we would have reformed the CPWG as quickly after the election as possible.
• it would have met relatively frequently.
• we would have got agreement (or as much agreement as feasible) around the criteria for school closures; those criteria do exist, but we 'could' have adjusted them after dialogue.
• we would have published the criteria first.
• we would not have blindly accepted any initial list presented to us by officers - many of the schools on the current list just DO NOT meet the current criteria. I still don't understand WHY they are on any public list at all?
• I would have rigorously tested each school-closure proposal, that came from officers, against the agreed criteria before going into the public domain.
• we would thus have had a well-considered programme, nowhere near the scale of the current proposals, based on clear criteria and we certainly would have agreed to any deputation requests.

WHAT HAVE WE GOT?

• well, frankly - it's a dog's breakfast, with the timetable and process changing every time its opened to challenge - just one recent example being here.
• the whole process has been discredited and it's now impossible to see any support forthcoming for these proposals as what's led to this point has been so seriously flawed.

A WAY FORWARD?

• the Administration should now abandon this programme, instigate meaningful dialogue with all interested and concerned parties before bringing any such proposals back to the Council for decision.
• if they did that, I'd publicly applaud them for listening, and our Group would join any CPWG that was subsequently formed and constructively use the years (if not decades) of individual experience we have to offer in this policy area.

Many apologies over the length of this post, but hope it has answered most - if not all - of the queries that have been put to me over the last few weeks.

PLEASE do follow the links from here, and previous posts, to access the full debate.

Targeted schools 'not half empty'

This story has got some prominence on the BBC Scotland website at the moment.

I really do think this is the tip of the ice-berg, as regards 'facts and figures' underlying the school closure proposals. I've had endless queries raised with me - mostly about the schools within or near my own ward - but I know from speaking to colleagues that the same applies right across the city.

There really should have been a more concerted effort to 'make the case' first before releasing the whole school closure list into the public domain ... that process, in itself, would have exposed any statistical flaws and led to some erroneous assumptions being removed from any calculations that led to the list.

Weekly Surgery

Weekly surgery at Fountainbridge Library this evening fairly busy.

... I don't 'usually' get many enquiries about educational matters directly at my surgery; but that was certainly 'not' the case earlier tonight.

Croc clothes?

Now, my love of Crocs caused me untold problems when I last posted about them ... you simply would not believe the grief I received by the way :-(

Well, I'll regret this I know, but I need to alert you to this story in today's Guardian ... shirts, shorts and skirts soon to be made from spongy, foam resin?

... and I'll bet the orders are flooding in already - just what is the world coming too??

And just to prove my point - the company you may be about to keep apparently goes something like this ...

... "fans of Crocs footwear include the actors Jack Nicholson and Al Pacino, royal consort Kate Middleton and even George Bush, who was pictured sporting grey Crocs with black socks recently" ...

... I rest my case :-))

Bit of a shambles ...

Well, it gets worse and worse ... at today's Education Committee, it transpired that the whole sequencing of the first round of consultations was a bit of a shambles frankly.

Have a look at the Table at Paragraph 9, bottom of page 2 ... here.

Go back and have another look - 6 of the 8 public meetings are AFTER the Committee next meets during the daytime of 24th September ... that's the Committee meeting where we were going to decide whether to keep open or shut an establishment??

Thus, on 24th September we would have decided whether to keep open or shut Grassmarket Nursery School, but the public meeting as part of the overall process is not until the evening of the 8th October.

Thankfully, and to her credit, the Convenor accepted the illogicality of the whole process and agreed to bring back these 8 proposals to the October meeting of the Committee ... all before they go, for ultimate decision, to the Full Council meeting on 22nd November (see paragraph 10 on page 3).

It's a dog's breakfast of a process, and my confidence in what is happening is diminishing instead of being strengthened. It can surely only get better ...

1st Education Committee tomorrow ...

Sorry - the blog is becoming a bit of a constant 'education' experience at the moment ... it is hard to avoid though, with feelings running so high in so many communities.

So, tomorrow sees the 1st meeting of the new Education Committee ... that's right, the Council has agreed to consult on closing 22 schools and 4 community centres and the new Education Committee, which will have the unalloyed joy of overseeing that whole process, hasn't even met yet.

Of course, it may be the cynic in me .... but it surely wouldn't have anything to do with the fact that the new Administration has no guaranteed majority on the Education Committee, due to the presence of an additional 5 voting members; 3 from the Churches, and 2 from the Unions - as opposed to the Full Council where it can always count upon the casting vote of the Provost.

It will be interesting to see how they approach this issue tomorrow - the report before them asks that the Committee "approves the attached papers for the purposes of consultation". I still don't see why we should.

St. Cuthbert's Primary School public meeting

St. Cuthbert's Primary School public meeting this evening ... I would say well over 200 people attended, which in itself is a big statement of the strength of feeling over it's 'proposed' closure.

It was principally a 'planning meeting' to organise an effective campaign in the run-up to, and during, the January/February 2008 formal consultation period ... but it was clear there was a lot of anger at the way the whole process had been handled to date.

I agree that local people have every right to be angry ... I still can't, for the life of me, see why the new Administration didn't just listen to the Deputations last Thursday ... they could easily have been asked to speak collectively, based on geography; or some similar criteria? As it was, we ended up listening to an hour of deputations on Meadowbank (all well and good) and one deputation about putting a tunnel under the Firth of Forth, when there wasn't even an item on the agenda about that subject ... but we couldn't listen to school parents??

Anyhow, back to this evening's meeting ... one significant (and I think valid) worry that did come up a lot was the reputational damage this whole process could do to the school. Even if (and it has to be an 'if' at the moment) it is saved, then existing and prospective parents could still be 'worried' into moving current children and/or applying for new child places at another school.

I find it all pretty annoying (to say the least) ... schools like St. Cuthbert's should never have been on the list and I've yet to hear any rational argument as to why it is? As far as I can see, it meets only 1 of the 10 criteria for Primary School closure consideration ... and that's "can be accommodated elsewhere". Hardly a rock solid case to shut it.

All that said, one 'positive' that came from the evening - and I guess the events leading up to it - was a recognition of the true value of a local school to a community and how important it is that such a facility should be supported. As someone at the meeting optimistically said ... 'if nothing else, this whole process will pull us all together and make the community stronger'.

I certainly hope that will indeed be a silver-lining in an otherwise unnecessary black-cloud for the local area.

Survived

Well, managed to survive the family gathering up at Auchterarder - only just.

And even the weather remained fine for the barbecue :-)

Auchterarder tomorrow ...

Off up to sunny Auchterarder tomorrow afternoon, where my brother lives, for a bit of a 'family barbecue/general gathering'.

... obviously hoping the weather holds out okay!

He is a distinctly bad influence on me - as I've mentioned before - so, may not be much blogging this weekend I'm afraid :-(

... just when you need a quiet, alcohol free weekend :-((

No, No, No

Thinking of yesterday ... nearly forgot to mention that the Lord Provost didn't just use his casting vote twice, but three times!

Yes indeed, the City Council was evenly divided 29/29 on three occasions and he cast his vote to say no to:

1. more than a dozen deputations being heard before the Full Council meeting, including at least one MP and one MSP, who wanted to speak to their elected representatives about the biggest potential school closure programme this city has ever seen.
2. the opposition motion asking the new Administration to abandon the programme of school closures and instigate meaningful dialogue with all interested and concerned parties before bringing any such proposals back to the Council for decision.
3. giving a civic reception to Scotland's World Cup champions - the Scottish Homelessness World Cup Team - to honour their fantastic achievement.

Welcome to the New Edinburgh :-((

Some more photos

Some photos from this week's demonstrations about the schools closure programme are available here. Thought they may be of interest ...

Farcical end to a serious day

There's no doubting that yesterday, if not very democratic, was a pretty serious day. It did though, I'm afraid to report, have a deeply farcical ending.

Near the end of the agenda (see item 11.10), the Administration actually "did" commence an attempt to bring back Robes for ceremonial occasions by passing a motion calling for a report on the topic.

On this one - what can I say - told you so!

I do though owe an apology to the two Tory Councillors (Buchan and Rust I think it was?) who had the good sense to vote with Labour and the Greens to try and stop this nonsense in it's tracks. Unfortunately, our combined numbers only only amounted to 20, with all the Libs/Nats and the remaining Tories totalling 38 and thus winning the day.

And it gets worse ... whilst speaking in the debate, the Council Leader said that she thought bringing back Robes for ceremonial occasions was a good idea because "it would separate us from the hoi polloi" ...

... I don't think she was referring to the Australian band of the same name; and yes, she REALLY did say it :-((

An affront to democracy

It was indeed a very long day yesterday, with the meeting lasting from 10am to beyond 8pm ... and as you can see from the picture, a lot of people turned up to protest about the proposed school closures and service cuts.

I'll come back to these two issues in later posts, but I do want to say a bit more about the meeting itself yesterday ... I frankly think the way that Deputation requests were treated was an affront to democracy. I did mention all of this in an earlier post and unfortunately my worst fears appear to have been justified.

Well over a dozen Deputation requests, including from at least one MP and one MSP, were refused a hearing on the casting vote of the Lord Provost ... the Chamber was split 29/29 and the Provost used his casting vote to pass the motion stopping members of the public from being heard, at a time of their choosing, in front of the people THEY elected to represent them.

I don't think there's any way you can claim that's democratic or fair.

I've been on the Council just over 8-years, and in that time have had to deal with some pretty vocal opponents ... I've never tried to quash open debate, and have always tried my utmost to allow those who disagreed with me to have their say.

Sometimes it cost me dearly ... but that's democracy.

Yesterday wasn't.

Full Council Meeting

August Full Council Meeting starts in a few hours - agenda here.

Reckon it could be a very long meeting indeed ... not just due to the schools issues, but also significant reports on sports facilities, general finance and decision-making structures to mention but the obvious.

... this could well be the last post of the day :-(

Fair play?

I'm going to do something slightly unusual here and paste below the anonymised (from/to) text of an e-mail that I've just received a copy of. I understand that the same text has now gone to several recipients across the city.

I should make it absolutely clear that I think the 'sender/s' of this message are entirely innocent actors and are only following instruction - as should be obvious from the text.

This is basically what Deputation requests are being told, as at 5pm yesterday. I really do think this is completely outrageous and anti-democratic ... how can one Councillor decide all of this without any reference to the Full Council, which doesn't meet to discuss the subject until tomorrow?

In essence, one Councillor has decided that NO deputations will be heard at tomorrow's Council meeting on the biggest school closure programme this city has ever seen proposed??

Not good.


=================

Subject: RE: deputation
Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2007 16:56:02 +0100
From:
To:

I refer to your request for a deputation to the Council meeting on 23 August 2007. As you are aware, the report on the Children and Families Estate Review contains proposals for hearing deputations on this matter. The report proposes that each community be invited to bring a deputation to a meeting of the Education, Children and Families Committee on a phased basis (the proposed consultation timescales are attached as Appendix 2 to the Director's report) and that deputations are not heard by the Council and the Education, Children and Families Committee at other stages of the process. This advice has been given to each organisation requesting a deputation on this issue and a number of those organisations have withdrawn their requests in the spirit of the proposed consultation process.

You have indicated that you would still like to go ahead with your request to be heard at the Council meeting. I have therefore spoken to Councillor Mrs MacLaren, the Executive Member for Education, Children and Families, and advised her that some organisations and individuals have withdrawn their requests but that others still wish to go ahead. She has taken this into account and does not think it would be fair to hear any deputations at the Council meeting. However, she has agreed that deputations wishing to speak on the general principles of the Review, without mentioning specific schools, can be heard at the first meeting of the new Education, Children and Families Committee on 28 August 2007.

Please confirm whether you wish to accept this offer.

=================

Stop the Cuts - but Ward life goes on ...

Obviously, the threatened closure of St. Cuthbert's Primary School is focusing most of my attention at the moment ...

... but - as well as trying to Stop the Council Cuts - other Ward life goes on, and just a very brief reminder that if you live anywhere within Fountainbridge/Craiglockhart (map here) then don't hesitate to come to one of my local surgeries - details here - I'll be at Fountainbridge Library in Dundee Street tomorrow (Wednesday) at 6pm.

If you can't make one of my surgeries, then do just write, 'phone or e-mail - all the details here.

I can't guarantee to always 'deliver' exactly what you want, but I can guarantee that I'll try my very best to help.