Richmond Council has negotiated the purchase of part of the former St John’s hospital site, in Strafford Road, Twickenham, for further primary school provision, subject to approval from Cabinet on Monday 22 February.
The purchase from the current owners, the South West London Mental Health Trust (MHT), will be conditional upon planning permission being obtained for the site.
It is anticipated that a planning application will be submitted later this year.
Cllr Malcolm Eady, Cabinet Member for Children’s Services and Culture on Richmond Council said;
“There is a high demand for primary school places in the East Twickenham and St Margarets area which has caused concern among parents for a number of years. I am very pleased that we will be able to obtain this site for school place provision.
“The purchase is subject to Cabinet approval on Monday, at which point we will be able to begin work on specific plans. If planning approval is obtained we will press hard for the new places to be available as soon as possible.”
The plans are part of the Council’s borough-wide school expansion programme.
Comments
Nice summary from Christopher Squire:
Peter @ stmgrts.org.uk on 2010-02-17 20:19:42 +0000Does anyone know what happened to the proposal to build a new school on the Brunel University site? Surely this would have solved many of the problems experienced by parents in the St Margarets area and eased the problem elsewhere. Would it also have been cheaper?
McCreddie M (Mac) on 2010-02-18 16:37:04 +0000There never was a proposal; the idea was part of the wish list of N St Mags parents at the time the planning brief for the site was being drafted but it didn't make it into the brief.
The Council didn't favour it because it would have inevitably have attracted children from across the borough border [because admission is decided by distance not residence] at the expense of the children resident in the borough that it had a statutory duty to provide places for. so it would have been a poor use of the council's limited capital budget.
I do not know how the land cost of the St John's scheme in 2010 compares to what a bit of the Brunel site would have cost then [2002].
There are other, party political, aspects to this decision which I won't go into as I don't know all the ins and outs of who said and did what when; in any case think they are irrelevant to the situation we are now in. I think the case I have made was the dominant one in the view of the Council officers. They would have also have pointed out that N St Mags, then as now, was well served [in terms of distance] by several primary schools run by Hounslow council.
Chris Squire on 2010-02-18 22:21:49 +0000The St.John's site is as close to the centre of Twickenham (and St.Mary's C of E) as it is to South St.Margarets and further away from East Twickenham than Orleans Infants. What will its catchment area be?
Quite what this does for North St.Margarets and the perennial oversubscription of Orleans Infants and the overspill into St.Stephen's I'm not sure.
Regarding the much heralded "£32 million" expenditure on primary schools. Does that include the £4 million approx NOT being spent on Orleans and St.Stephen's?
Ian on 2010-02-19 14:24:31 +00001: There are no predefined 'catchment areas': admission to each oversubscribed school is determined solely by distance from home to that school. The new school's relationship to St Mary's is unclear and it may be that it has not yet been decided.
2: The new school will reduce the demand for places at Orleans from children living closer to it than those in N St Margarets & E Twickenham, freeing up places for the latter to take. Alternatively they can put the new school as their first choice. There will be enough places to go round but it is true that they will be no closer than at present.
3: Yes and no: the £32 million is the total budget for the current programme of work & will be spent on primary schools across the borough; more [as much again] will have to be spent in the near future. Both the Orleans and St. Stephen's 'all-though' schemes have been abandoned but instead Orleans will be expanded to 4-form entry; I do not know at what cost.
Nor do I know how much the site has cost or what the new school will cost. I imagine that the site cost will be new [borrowed] money and won't come from the £32 million.
Chris Squire on 2010-02-19 16:08:22 +0000Interested to hear that Orleans Infants "will be" expanded to 4 form entry, designed for 9 classes, currently housing 11. Same old question, where will they go for KS2 if St. Stephen's sticks at 12 classes?
Oh, I forgot the council's secret educational weapon - they go private!
Ian on 2010-02-22 07:45:59 +0000On the face of it this looks like a great idea and as a resident of North St Margarets is much welcomed as the situation in North St Margarets is utterly chronic from the research I've done (I will have a daughter who is 4 in the 2012 year).
Do we have access to any stats/analysis that indicates what the situation will be like once this school has been built? Eg currently how many children that do not get into their first or second choice school who will now be able to?
Gut feel is that this new school will greatly help the situation but may not entirely solve it, so I think it's a shame that plans to expand other schools - eg Orleans Infant - appear to have been shelved.
Also, is the date for this school to be built likely to be September 2012 as I've read, or is that rather ambitious?
Glen Collins on 2010-02-22 09:55:29 +0000Ian: I think [without access to the figures] that because the demand at KS2 is less than at Reception there is always spare capacity across the borough. So it is question of who goes where. The new school will naturally be preferred to St Stephen's by parents who live south of the railway, freeing up the latter to take the children from N St Margarets.
Glen: No we don't have any stats at present. The cabinet paper says: " . . Taking this year's demand, as well as actual birth data from 2008, into account, with an underlying assumption that the recession and its legacy will continue to affect demand in the next few years, the revised forecasts are as follows:
School year: 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 Births: 2,767 2,884 2,865 Forecast no. of Reception pupils: 2,275 2,369 2,352 Capacity (without expansions): 1,933 1,933 1,933 Forecast shortfall of places: 342 436 419
Clearly, the planned expansions set out within the Primary Expansions Strategy will only partially meet demand if the forecasts become reality in 2010/2011 and future years. The Strategy stated that another phase of permanent expansions would probably be needed, given that there is only a limited number of schools which would be able to accommodate additional temporary classes. Further details of the outline proposals that are under consideration for the St John's site are set out in the confidential report item on this Cabinet agenda."
As for the schedule, the cabinet paper says: ' . . planning permission to be . . obtained by the end of 2010, construction during 2011, with opening of a new school in September 2012 ...'. 2 ½ years in toto seems plenty of time to me. No doubt the contract will include enough penalty clauses to ensure that the work is done by the deadline.
Chris Squire on 2010-02-22 11:40:07 +0000Thanks Christopher - its really appreciated that you're engaging in this conversation with us. Can I ask - are you on the Council?
Re. the capacity numbers; what are these based on? All schools in the borough? Or a set number of schools in the local area? It would be good to know as it has a huge impact on the numbers you gave. Eg if we know that there is capacity from a set number of schools we can at least view each school to see what we think of them.
Currently, as we're on the borders of Hounslow, Im unsure whether we would be given a place in a Hounslow school (the two nearest us I am not keen on) so knowing the exact schools we would get into would be extremely useful.
Glen Collins on 2010-02-22 12:14:25 +0000Glen:
1: No, I am not on the Council; the ward councillor leading on this issue is Philip Morgan [see: www.richmond.libdems.org.uk/pages/smnt.html for details] who is LEA Governor at Orleans Infants; I am one of his supporters and am basing my remarks on public knowledge only.
2: The capacity numbers are for the borough; they comes from the Education Authority, which has, by law, to offer a place at at school within the borough to every child resident in the borough who wants one. Their plans, which are set out in Primary Expansions Strategy 2009 [http://www.richmond.gov.uk/consultation_on_school_expansions_strategy_2009-2016.pdf] and Primary Strategy for Change 2008 [http://www.richmond.gov.uk/primary_strategy_for_change_june_2008-2.pdf], are now being implemented across the borough, at a capital cost of £32 mn for the first phase only; as much again for the rest later in this decade. The forecast of demand to 2012/13 I gave above is new: it replaces those in these 2 Strategies - and shows that they are an insufficient response.
3: Admission to a school is determined solely by distance, not by residence, but it is LBRuT that must offer you a place, which doesn't have to be convenient for you.
4: In September 2010 there will be LBRuT Reception places locally at Orleans Infants, St Mary's Amyand Road and on the St John's site [which may or may not be a separate new school]. We do not yet know enough detail to estimate whether there will be enough of them to enable all the infants from north of Northcote Road to get into one of these LBRuT schools. That is what the LEA is aiming for but it may fall short.
5: The insufficiency of places is a London-wide phenomenon, so the Hounslow reception classes will also be full. So you are unlikely to get a place at the more distant schools, particularly as they may of course also be the more popular ones. However it is worth checking what expansion plans they have for 2012.
Chris Squire on 2010-02-22 14:49:02 +0000Thanks Chris - very useful - I'll stop bombarding you with questions now!
Glen Collins on 2010-03-01 16:06:46 +0000Add a comment