The MP for Walsall and Bloxwich has called on the Government to abandon its plan of destroying woodland to build a school and instead repurpose an existing vacant school. Labour MP Valerie Vaz raised the issue in general debate at Westminster Hall in a bid to save taxpayers’ money.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00Snaid Community School was closed in 2011. It was re-established as a
00:04University Technical College by Wolverhampton University in Walsall
00:07College. It was closed in 2015 and is a perfectly viable school. Headteachers in
00:12the area, Madam Deputy Speaker, have suggested this could be used as a
00:15special school. Instead, public money is being used to destroy the vegetation at
00:22Reedswood Park to build a special free school. Joseph Leckie School
00:27has offered to work with the council to expand places where they're needed. In
00:32fact, they've got a waiting list of 30 places for each year. They need a new
00:37canteen, a kitchen, a new dining hall and I've been working with them
00:41since 2010 so that they get their full allocation of building schools for the
00:44future money which they have not got. What the headmaster has said, he
00:49hopes to fund an inspirational learning campus that is really fit for purpose
00:54and I hope that the minister will take that back to the Secretary of State to
00:59ensure that we can all work together to ensure that public money is used to expand
01:04the current schools rather than to build a new school.