Councillors criticised over decision to remove primary school from catchment plans

Elgan Hearn, Local Democracy Reporter

Senior councillors have been criticised for removing a primary school from a proposed secondary school catchment area.

Education portfolio holder Cllr Sue Edmunds appeared before councillors at a meeting of Blaenau Gwent council’s Children, Young People and Families scrutiny committee on Tuesday, March 17.

There she attempted to justify the cabinet’s decision when the catchment area for Brynmawr school was settled at a meeting last month.

This ran contrary to the recommendation made by the committee when councillors had looked at the issue at a meeting in January.

This followed a consultation on the issue.

Cllr Edmunds (Labour – Ebbw Vale South) explained that from the consultation results there was a clear preference expressed by the school community of Beaufort Hill to keep Beaufort primary school in the Ebbw Fawr 3-16 Learning Community catchment area.

This showed that 78.7 per cent of the respondents wanted Beaufort Hill kept out of the Brynmawr catchment area.

Cllr Edmunds said: “The cabinet felt than in this instance it was appropriate to accept that the concerns from Beaufort Hill school community around transition outweighed the overall sufficiency needs of the area.”

She added that this doesn’t “fully deal” with the imbalance of pupils spread across Blaenau Gwent secondary schools and that the decision will be “kept under review.”

Cllr Edmunds said: “It may lead to further adjustments to catchment areas in the future.”

Cllr John Hill (Opposition Independents – Brynmawr) said: “I think it was the wrong decision and I’m in no doubt about that.

“We all know the situation is going to get worse and somewhere down the line you will have to address the imbalance.”

He explained it was not about “protecting Brynmawr” but that parents will have to “race” to get applications for their preferred secondary school in to the council.

“It’s going to be a nightmare for parents,” said Cllr Hill.

He asked what would happen if Ebbw Fawr is oversubscribed?

Cllr Edmunds said that decisions would be made based on catchment area, whether siblings are already at the school and finally, how far away children live from their preferred school.

She stressed that this had not been an issue this year.

Cllr Helen Cunningham (non-aligned – Llanhilleth) said: “What impact will this decision have on Brynmawr?”

Cllr Edmunds said that around 15 to 20 pupils would “not be going” to Brynmawr from Beaufort Hill.

Cllr Edmunds said: “It’s complicated.

“A large part of the Beaufort Hill school population comes from outside the area anyway and they would not (live) in the catchment area for Brynmawr.

“Where funding is concerned each child brings a pot of money.

“You are funded by the number of children and that reduces the funding that goes to Brynmawr.”

But some on the committee welcomed the cabinet’s decision.

Cllr Chris Smith (Labour – Beaufort) said: “I was totally pleased when this was overturned by cabinet.

“Talking to parents the view was there’s no way Beaufort Hill is part of Brynmawr, so I welcome that.”

The committee noted the report.

Brynmawr comprehensive school became a grant-maintained foundation school back in the 1990s to save it from being closed by the council.

A foundation school means that the governing body have a far greater say on running the school and what is taught there.