8 Labour councillors on Wirral Council vote to close Lyndale School from 31st August 2016

8 Labour councillors on Wirral Council vote to close Lyndale School from 31st August 2016

8 Labour councillors on Wirral Council vote to close Lyndale School from 31st August 2016

                                                 

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Yesterday (17th December 2014) Wirral Council’s Cabinet decided to close Lyndale School in Eastham on 31st August 2016. You can watch video of how the decision was reached in the above video, the item on Lyndale School starts at 50 seconds into the meeting. Two of the Cabinet (Cllr Stuart Whittingham and Cllr Chris Meaden) were absent at the Cabinet meeting when it was made.

The councillor who proposed closure of the Lyndale School was Cllr Tony Smith (Cabinet Member for Children and Family Services). This was seconded by Cllr Ann McLachlan (Cabinet Member for Governance, Commissioning and Improvement).

The vote was as follows:

In favour of closing the Lyndale School from 31/8/16

Cllr Phil Davies (Labour, Birkenhead & Tranmere)

Cabinet 17th December 2014 vote on Lyndale School L to R Shirley Hudsepth Surjit Tour Cllr Phil Davies Graham Burgess
Cabinet 17th December 2014 vote on Lyndale School L to R Shirley Hudsepth Surjit Tour Cllr Phil Davies Graham Burgess

Cllr Ann McLachlan (Labour, Bidston & St James) * Note Seconder of motion
Cllr George Davies (Labour, Claughton)
Cllr Tony Smith (Labour, Upton) * Note Proposer of motion

Cabinet 17th December 2014 vote on Lyndale School closure L to R Cllr Tony Smith Cllr George Davies Cllr Ann McLachlan
Cabinet 17th December 2014 vote on Lyndale School closure L to R Cllr Tony Smith Cllr George Davies Cllr Ann McLachlan

Cllr Adrian Jones (Labour, Seacombe)
Cllr Chris Jones (Labour, Seacombe)
Cllr Pat Hackett (Labour, New Brighton)
Cllr Bernie Mooney (Labour, Liscard)

Cabinet 17th December 2014 vote on Lyndale School closure L to R Cllr Bernie Mooney Cllr Pat Hackett Cllr Chris Jones Cllr Adrian Jones
Cabinet 17th December 2014 vote on Lyndale School closure L to R Cllr Bernie Mooney Cllr Pat Hackett Cllr Chris Jones Cllr Adrian Jones

Total 8

Voting Against closing the Lyndale School from 31/8/16

Total 0

Abstentions

Total 0

Therefore with eight votes for, none against and no abstentions, the motion was agreed.

It is possible that at some future point six (or more) councillors will request a call in of this decision. However the Coordinating Committee would decide such a call in and is now short of the two parent governor representatives required to hear a call in on such a matter, you can read this blog post about the questions I asked of Cllr Tony Smith earlier in the week about that.

The Coordinating Committee has 9 Labour councillors, 5 Conservative councillors, 1 Lib Dem, 2 parent governor representatives (although both positions are now vacant) as well as a representative of the Catholic Diocese. It should also have a representative from the Anglican Diocese of Shrewsbury, however the Anglicans have (to my knowledge) not chosen someone yet. That’s a committee of 19 people. However three positions are vacant.

Those associated with the Lyndale School will probably be asking their legal advisers to send a Letter before Claim in this format to Wirral Council’s Cabinet and Wirral Council’s legal department in the near future. Once Wirral Council has received such a letter, they usually have 14 days to respond to such a letter. If the response is not to the proposed Claimant/s’s satisfaction it is highly likely that a case will be filed promptly with the Administrative Court (part of the Royal Courts of Justice) requesting permission for judicial review of the decision to close the school.

If decision on permission for judicial review was granted by a High Court Judge, then it would proceed to a hearing. A decision on permission (if the case was filed in January 2015) would be expected within around three months. If permission is given, a decision on this matter by the court would be expected to be decided within a year (that is if the case if filed in January 2015 by around January 2016 or possibly sooner but certainly before 31st August 2016).

Two newspapers that cover the Wirral area have also written pieces about this decision which you may be interested in reading:

Heartbreak for parents as Wirral Council’s cabinet vote unanimously to close Lyndale (Wirral Globe) by Emma Rigby

Wirral council under fire after rubber-stamping decision to shut Lyndale special school (Liverpool Echo) by Liam Murphy

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Will Wirral Council's Cabinet decide to close Lyndale School on the 31st August 2016?

Will Wirral Council’s Cabinet decide to close Lyndale School on the 31st August 2016?

Will Wirral Council’s Cabinet decide to close Lyndale School on the 31st August 2016?

                                                                

Councillor Tony Smith at the Special Cabinet Meeting of 4th September 2014 to discuss Lyndale School L to R Cllr Stuart Whittingham, Cllr Tony Smith, Cllr Bernie Mooney, Lyndzay Roberts
Councillor Tony Smith at the Special Cabinet Meeting of 4th September 2014 to discuss Lyndale School L to R Cllr Stuart Whittingham, Cllr Tony Smith, Cllr Bernie Mooney, Lyndzay Roberts

One of the things I’ve mulled over the past few days are the papers published for the special Cabinet meeting on Thursday 17th December. Due to the volume of paperwork to do with this item, this small piece can’t do justice to the matter so I suggest you read the paperwork for that agenda item on Wirral Council’s website in full.

Sadly for Tranmere Rover’s fans (issues to do with the training ground are agenda item 4) it is agenda item 3 (Report Detailing the Outcome of the Representation Period about the Proposed Closure of The Lyndale School) and its six appendices that is the subject of this piece.

The whole matter is also connected to this Freedom of Information Act request I made on the 20th November 2014 for the consultation responses (refused yesterday on s.21 grounds as redacted consultation responses (99 A4 pages of them) were published as part of the Cabinet papers here).

I will probably request an internal review of the Freedom of Information Act request later today as Wirral Council (due to the redactions) have not supplied me with the consultation responses as much information is missing and they haven’t given a reason under the Freedom of Information Act legislation as to why.

I also have put in a request for a question to Cllr Tony Smith at next Monday’s Council meeting (to which I’ll get a supplementary question), the question (that I emailed in on the 4th December 2014) is this:

This is my question for the Council meeting on the 15th December 2014 to Cllr Tony Smith (Cabinet Member for Children and Family Services).

——————————————————————————————————-
Wirral Council recently had a four-week consultation on the closure of the Lyndale School in Eastham and there will be a special Cabinet meeting later this month on the 17th December 2014.

Can you please answer:

(a) how many responses were received by Wirral Council to the latest four-week consultation on closure of the Lyndale School,
(b) whether the text of the responses to the latest four-week consultation will be published in full (rather than a summary in a Cabinet report) and if so when,
(c) whether all Cabinet Members making a decision on the 17th December 2014 will in advance of making a decision at the meeting of the 17th December 2014 have read all the written consultation responses to the four-week consultation on closure prior to making their decision on the 17th December 2014

and

(d) whether all Cabinet Members making a decision on the 17th December 2014 will in advance of making a decision at the meeting of the 17th December 2014 have read the statutory guidance for decision makers on this matter issued earlier this year by the government which is available online?

——————————————————————————————————-

Obviously parts (a) and (b) have been answered by the Cabinet papers being published. Hopefully in answer to (c) he will give the answer that he and the other Cabinet Members will find the time between now and the Cabinet meeting on Thursday evening to read the 99 pages of consultation responses and in answer to (d) the 76 pages of statutory guidance.

The current recommendation from officers is that the school is not closed on the 31st December 2015, but is closed on the 31st August 2016 instead.

There are many matters I could write here about the decision to be made, however I will make these points. If I remember correctly Wirral Council’s constitution in Article 13 (principles of decision-making) specifically Article 13.2 states that when reaching decisions councillors (bear in mind Council here also means decisions made by Wirral Council’s Cabinet) that:

“All decisions of the Council will be made in accordance with the following principles:

(a) proportionality (i.e. the action must be proportionate to the desired outcome);
(b) due consultation and the consideration of professional advice from officers;
(c) respect for human rights;
(d) a presumption in favour of openness;
(e) clarity of aims and desired outcomes; and
(f) Wednesbury reasonableness (i.e. the decision must not be so unreasonable that no reasonable Council could have reached it, having taken into account all relevant considerations, and having ignored irrelevant considerations). ”

Some interesting points I wish to make here, only the professional advice from officers needs to be considered. If officers are for example giving amateurish (not professional) advice or have flat out got things wrong it doesn’t need to be factored into the decision.

The consultation responses have been redacted heavily but the advice of officers hasn’t.

What are the clear aims of closing down the Lyndale School (on whatever date)?

Bearing in mind they have a legal duty, that is they must pay regard to the statutory guidance at all stages of the decision-making process on closing the school (for example at the earlier Cabinet meetings, the Council meeting, the Coordinating Committee meetings) as the statutory guidance (published in January 2014 and presumably there was earlier guidance before this) hasn’t been included on the agenda until now can that actually be proved for the earlier decisions that led to this?

Have all the human rights considerations been properly considered? There are matters beyond what I’ve written here that I may bring up in my supplementary question on Monday evening.

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