Parents fear school legacy
Guy Kingston addressed North Somerset Council on Tuesday night and presented the hypothetical case of a child called 'Sammy'.
Mr Kingston, spokesman for the Long Ashton School Crisis Group (LASCG), said he wanted councillors to understand the human impact that bussing young children five or more miles causes.
Mr Kingston, who has a three-year-old son facing the prospect of not getting a place in Long Ashton, said: "A human story is exactly what the council needs to hear because this issue is about real people, yet the council has managed to dehumanise the whole process.
"It's a crazy situation; temporary classrooms would cost around £8.50 per child per week – less than the cost of transporting them.
"Yet the council is mired in bureaucratic process and appears blind both to the human misery it has caused and the economic sense of our proposals."
He told councillors assembled at Weston Town Hall that 'Sammy' was a Long Ashton everychild, who was doing well at pre-school but, at the age of four, would be split from his friends.
He painted a picture of 'Sammy' being bullied on bus journeys because there was no supervision, and retreating into his shell. He said he could also develop behavioural problems that would affect his education and ultimately his life-chances.
He said the group had been quoted £250 a week for a temporary classroom on the car park at Birdwell.
He said: "By concentrating on the very necessary long-term rebuild of Birdwell School at the expense of short-term measures to install temporary classrooms, the council is abandoning a generation of Long Ashton children."
Cllr Jeremy Blatchford, the executive member for education, said this was an extreme case being presented to pull on people's heartstrings.
He said there was only one four-year-old from the village who this year had to use council-supplied transport, a taxi, to go to school at Crockerne in Pill.
He said most of the other 23 children who couldn't get a place at Birdwell or Northleaze schools in the village had got places at nearby schools such as Flax Bourton and Felton.
He added: "There is a shortage of primary school places in Long Ashton only at entry level. There are places available if a child of eight or 10 moves to the village. Early indications are that the problem next year may not be quite as great as we feared."
He said it was incredibly difficult to predict future intake levels and the major problem was how difficult Birdwell or Northleaze are to extend because of their location on the edge of the green belt.
It would, according to Cllr Blatchford, cost £7 million to rebuild Birdwell.
Anna Oxberry, chairman of the LASCG, said: "This problem is only going to get worse as the demographics of Long Ashton are changing quickly, plus many more new homes are scheduled to be built in and around the village in the next few years. The longer the council leaves this, the much worse it will get."
The group wants concerned parents, grandparents or carers to register with it at www.lascg.org.uk to join the campaign.
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