The week in Westminster

Rob Wilson MP • Published 7 Oct 2010 11:00 5 Comments

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I’ve been spending conference season with my head down doing as much work in my constituency as possible. During the last three weeks I think I’ve accepted every invitation it is possible to accept, even the odd opening of an envelope (although I admit I did have a couple of days when I went down with man-flu).

Schools and education have featured heavily in my constituency schedule, handing out prizes, Tesco computers and dealing with admissions arrangements and catchment areas. Yet again this has become a big issue, this time in East Reading.

Because Berkshire was split into six local authorities in 1997 (too many in my view), education provision often overlaps with many children criss-crossing local authority boundaries.

This isn’t normally a huge issue, but it has been added to by Reading’s poor performance over the last decade or so as a Local Education Authority, with many parents choosing non Reading-run schools or private schools rather than run the risk of a poor education for their child. Nearly 50% of Reading’s children either go out of borough or to private schools.

Admittedly, it’s not all one way traffic as our grammar schools take many children from outside the borough – to the great annoyance of many parents who write to me to ask why.

Parents in East Reading are rightly very concerned that an Independent Review Panel has proposed that children in East Reading should no longer fall within Maiden Erlegh catchment area.

For many families Maiden Erlegh is their closest school and also a very good one – it’s shortly to become an academy, which is fantastic for the school. Parents see no reason to change the current arrangements and nor do I! But I accept the issue is a tricky one because parents in Lower Earley also feel it is their closest school and want to use it.

There have been several admissions appeals by Lower Earley parents and Wokingham borough was instructed to look at this particular catchment area as well as secondary admissions across the borough by the Independent Adjudicator.

I agree that Wokingham needs to look at things afresh, but the proposal made by the Independent Panel is simply wrong and should be rejected.

I could understand a proposal for a shared catchment area that included both Bulmershe and Maiden Erlegh schools, but not one that completely ignores proximity to the school for one set of parents. I hope everybody affected in my constituency will make their views known as part of the consultation.

In the medium term both Reading and Wokingham need to think about provision of more secondary places for their own children.

East Reading probably needs its own secondary school and where better than the current Thames Valley University site in Crescent Road?

TVU will want to sell this site in due course as it pulls out of Reading to West London and it has the space and ready-made classrooms to become a school.

Finally, well done and congratulations to Highdown School, under the leadership of headmaster Tim Royal. I understand the school is going to become an academy which is a fantastic achievement for the school and terrific for Caversham parents. Well done to Tim, the governing body and his staff, the school is ambitious for its pupils and is clearly going places!

Have your say. Post a comment on this article.

AKUK
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Oct 7, 19:36
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"Parents see no reason to change the current arrangements and nor do I."

How about this reason: Schools are not evenly distributed around Wokingham borough. Under the current arrangements, some children travel 0.5 miles to their school, however, other children have to travel 3 miles to their school. Under the new arrangements all children would travel 1.5 miles to their school. This is the very definition of Fair.

Rob, as I think you well know, the concerns of the parents you refer to are purely selfish, they are 100% to do with the fact that they do not, for some reason, want their children to go to Bulmershe school.

Wokingham has PLENTY of provision for its children, in fact the over capacity allows Reading Council to send 700 pupils per year to Wokingham schools!

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LEWK
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Oct 7, 22:24
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Dear Rob, East Reading and Earley/Lower Earley are two well defined communities. The new proposal finally unites our fragmented community in Earley/Lower Earley. The proposals are logical and totally rational. Reading needs to address its own problems for the mass exodus of school children to other boroughs (‘rather than run the risk of poor education’ as you put it) and this should not involve the displacement of our children from their local school just because Reading LA got it wrong! Don’t hold back the education of children by saying you reject the reviews of the independent review board. The Earley/Lower Earley community needs change and this should not be dictated by the apparent poor performance of Reading LA over the past decade.

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Earley born and bred
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Oct 8, 20:36
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The schools are not evenly distributed around Wokingham Borough Council and Lower Earley should have had a school long ago. Berkshire County Council should not have closed Alfred Sutton Senior schools. Wokingham Borough Council should not have closed Ryeish Green. And children in Lower Earley should have the chance to go to their closest school.

But.. ..

To exclude children who live school close to Maiden Erlegh school just because they live in Reading Borough seems grossly unfair. The proposals as they stand are shifting the problem for one set of parents to another.

A shared Designated Area for Maiden Erlegh and the Bulmershe school for Earley, Lower Earley and East Reading does seem a reasonable compromise.

Lots of Lower Earley children would gain places and would be able to walk to school and so would many children in East Reading who live equally as close.

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fuffyaya
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Oct 9, 10:15
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A shared area for Earley/Lower Earley residents and those of East Reading would be fair. As the proposed changes stand, children who live 5 to 10 minutes walk away from Maiden Earley are unable to go, just because they live in Reading rather than Wokingham. WBC did not include a single Reading resident in its admissions forum and was underhand in publishing its proposals and still has the audacity to claim it was an independent review. Reading residents do not want more than anyone living in Wokingham; they just want to be treated equally. There is not a shortage of school places in this area, if cross border movement of school children is allowed, a system which caused no problems when education was controlled by the Berkshire LEA. WBC has shown itself to be unequal to the task, shutting Ryeish Green, where school places are needed, and allowing itself to be imbroiled in local politics rather than being impartial over the education of children. To build a new school in east Reading would help Reading residents if WBC continues to behave in this manner, but as it will take time to be established, it is no help to parents like myself whose child is to start secondary school in 2012.

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Reading
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Oct 9, 10:22
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Rob states ‘Parents see no reason to change the current arrangements and nor do I!’

Have you actually looked at the current mess of the school catchment areas Rob? Keeping Park included on the map just does not look logical and divides what should be the natural community of east Reading. There must be a significant transit of Reading pupils to Bulmershe School right by this area already. It does not appear rational that children should have to pass through one catchment area to get to another (especially when Park is closest to Bulmershe itself). In the medium term, there are probably enough school places for every child without building a completely new school. However, those places need to be shared between Bulmershe and Maiden Erlegh. Many in Park are better situated than most in Lower Earley to attend Bulmershe, a school that is valued by many people. Therefore, this proposal by an independent review board is ‘not one that completely ignores proximity to the school for one set of parents’. Any fair and balanced argument should consider the proximity of ‘both’ sets of parents to each school. This sounds the most logical and cost effective way to me. Therefore, I cannot comprehend why you would reject the proposals.

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