13th January 2004
Think
Again – HM Inspectorate’s Damning Verdict on Inverclyde’s
“Unsatisfactory” School Buildings Crisis
Inverclyde
Council’s under-fire Liberal Democrat leadership must urgently rethink their
“unsatisfactory” schools policy, says the HM Inspectorate of Education.
Published
today, the scathing report:
MSP
for Greenock and Inverclyde, Duncan McNeil, said he was shocked at the report.
“You
couldn’t make this up.
A council which has decaying, damp
and frankly disgraceful school buildings, scraps an £80 million modernisation
and rebuilding programme without having the first idea about what to put in its
place.
“If
it wasn’t in an independent report from HM Inspectorate, you wouldn’t
believe it.”
“Since
the summer, I have been one of many who was predicting that this would be a
disaster.
“It
gives me no satisfaction, but the Inspectorate spells it out in black and white
– it has come to pass. We’ve
gone past the prediction stage. This
report makes it clear that today, tomorrow, the next day and the day after that,
the policies of Inverclyde Council will damage our kids’ education.
“The
previous Labour administration had plans which the independent inspectors say
were ‘ambitious’ and ‘well-founded.’
Plans which ‘addressed value for money issues.’
Plans which would have provided ‘children and pupils in Inverclyde with
high quality buildings in which to learn.’
Plans which would ‘have resulted, over time, in every pupil being
educated in either a new or a refurbished school building.’
“That
the Liberals simply tore these plans up with no thought to the future is nothing
short of scandalous and will be acutely embarrassing to the Liberal
Democrats in the Scottish Parliament – especially the Deputy Education
Minister. He,
after all, is committed to delivering the Partnership
Agreement promise
to ‘develop the largest ever school building programme in Scotland’s
history.’ How much longer will he
tolerate his own party colleagues obstructing this policy?
“This
amateurish vandalism of our education system cannot go on and I will be making
representations to the Minister, asking how the Executive proposes to respond to
this scathing report.”
The
independent inspectors condemn the Liberals’ decision, when they took control
of the Council from Labour last May, to scrap the “ambitious, but
well-founded” £80 million school building and modernisation programme, saying
“the new administration’s decision to revoke the plans and the inevitable
delays” has “resulted in an unsatisfactory situation.”
The
Council must, the inspectors say, “act quickly to reconsider the options open
to them” as local pupils’ education is already suffering.
The
report also questions whether the council could actually fund any future plan,
raising doubts “over the feasibility of the Council’s preferred funding
options”.
Despite
the failure of the political leadership of the Council, however, education
professionals and officials in Inverclyde continue to do a first class job.
The Director of Education and his officials are highly praised for their
drive to improve standards. Attainment,
the report highlights at length, has continued to improve since 2001.
“Very good progress” has been made in serving pupils with special
educational needs. And work to promote enterprise, citizenship and links with
local industry is welcomed.
But,
“in contrast” to these “positive and successful initiatives … and
despite the best endeavours of the Director of Education Services and his staff,
there had been major weaknesses in the Council’s attempts to improve school
buildings”.
This,
say the inspectors, is already having an effect.
“The lack of progress continued to impact on pupils’ experiences and
prevented effective use of the resources available to improve them,” they
state.
The
local authority’s lack of any coherent or feasible alternative plan is also
criticised. “The new
administration, elected in May 2003, reversed the decision to proceed with the
plan, but did not offer an alternative,” notes the Inspectorate.
This caused “a significant number of individuals and representatives of
key stakeholder groups” to express concerns over “the lack of a clearly
articulated alternative plan.”
The
report also reveals that many of those interviewed by the inspection team said
the Council’s actions had hit staff morale.
While officers were working to raise it, they had not been entirely
successful.
ENDS
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