How was the history of the Lyndale School closure consultation rewritten by Wirral Council?
Phil Ward who chaired the consultation (Wirral Council’s SEN Lead) at a later meeting of Wirral Schools Forum 2nd July 2014
A while ago, well nearly two months ago I was at the last of the six consultation meetings about Lyndale School. Nobody could really fathom out then why the officers were keeping the notes of these meetings “a secret”. In fact, had it not been for the Freedom of Information Act request of the Wallasey Conservatives I doubt they wouldn’t have been published for a further few weeks (and let’s face it they can use “future publication” as a reason to turn down FOI requests).
The officer chairing that meeting, Phil Ward was adamant in that meeting that the notes were for councillors on the Cabinet. Previously on this blog I’ve written up a transcript of the first hour or so of that meeting. Yesterday I compared the transcript of the meeting to the notes that officers wanted to use to tell Cabinet Members about the meeting.
One of the councillors in Eastham (where Lyndale School is) (who was present at the meeting) is Cllr Chris Carubia. He has written several books for example, The Raven Flies which is described as “finding out the location of his father, Sigurd and his crew, join King Olaf of Norway’s invasion to the land of the Moor’s, encounter a strange new culture and battle a savage new enemy”. I’ve never read any of his books (this isn’t really a blog for book reviews) but this is to make a point. The reason I mention this obscure fact is that his books would be put in a library under the “fiction” section. He used his imagination to come up with them. They’re made up.
This is probably where the notes (which let’s face it officers were going to use to persuade Cabinet to make the decision they wanted) should be as they are veering towards a fictional account of that meeting. Now the alternative viewpoint is, oh don’t be so cruel John, officers are doing their best under difficult circumstances. Yes, they are, but we’ve seen this subtle rewriting of history recently before at the Improvement Board where Wirral Council asked for questions from the public, rewrote their questions and handed out the “approved” version of history to those at the meeting hoping nobody would “spot the difference”.
So what is the proof I have of this? Well yesterday (and believe me it took some time to do as it was a two-hour meeting) I compared the notes to the transcript of what was said by whom. I am only about halfway through the meeting. It is only then when you can compare and contrast the two versions that you see what edits were made, what was left out and how things were changed. After all this is consultation, Wirral-style where we ask for your contributions but then officers meddle afterwards with them.
Call me biased (because let’s face it on Lyndale I am and it’s an editorial line we all agree on here but this is a serious point about how consultations are done and how decision-making happens). Is this the way consultations should be done? If the information politicians take into account when making important decisions has been altered in between being gathered and being put before politicians by officer/s is this honest? Does the way the notes were presented originally give anybody reading them the impression that the meeting was vastly different to how it happened and the misleading impression (as apart from a brief list of some present) as no names are used so that officer’s views can look like people responding to the consultation?
Below this is just the first half of the meeting compared to the notes. Things I have added are I hope highlighted in green. There are aspects of the notes that are broadly similar to what happened and I’ve left them in unedited. The aspects of the notes that seem to be at odds with what was said, have got a line through and are replaced with a direct quote of what was actually said. There are sections which were originally blank in the notes and some of the extra detail has been added.
This is so you can compare the “Wirral Council version” to my version of what happened based on the transcript. I hope that is clear. Most of the changes happen to the “key points” column. As names aren’t in the original version, this could’ve originally given the misleading impression that “key points” were made by the public. However this is just officers’ (and the Cabinet Member’s) viewpoints. It would take a long time to transcribe the rest of the meeting and do the same with the last few pages of the notes. If I have the time I will though. You can listen to the whole consultation meeting at Acre Lane about Lyndale from start to finish if you wish. Please leave a comment on this as (as has been mentioned many times by politicians and others before) getting consultation right is key to the decision making process at Wirral Council.
Annotations are added in red.
Public Consultation Meeting re The Lyndale School held at Acre Lane
16th June 2014: 5.30pm to 7.30pm
In Attendance:
Julia Hassall: Director of Children’s Services, Phil Ward Senior Manager SEN, Councillor Tony Smith: Lead Member for Children and Family Services (arrived late not present from start), David Armstrong: Assistant Chief Executive, Andrew Roberts: Senior Manager School Funding and Resources.
Attendees 34.
Questions/Comments Key points
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Can we have a copy of the notes which you have been taking throughout the 6 consultation meetings Could you then have key bullet points, or pick up the themes and can we see them. |
These are high level summary notes and not minutes and we will be using them to inform Cabinet. They are to capture your views Phil Ward: “They’re not for circulation.” They will be made public when our report goes to Cabinet |
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I have been to 100 companies so far and have asked them what they think of the closure of Lyndale and they are 100% against it. You are public servants and you should be serving the needs of people not yourself |
Thank you for your comments Phil Ward: “Is that something you’d like to submit to us?” |
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The consultation document is not worth the paper it is written on |
Phil Ward: “point taken” |
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When the children’s assessments are done will they be used to cost need. Will you look at the banding |
The assessment is about capturing the most up to date information of a child. This will be done on an individual basis Phil Ward “then we had captured the up to date information that we retain on the children so that we could begin on an individual family basis” The banding system is new and it was agreed by the Schools Forum. There will be review after the first year. DA/AR will feed this information you are raising back to the Forum David Armstrong “Just on the banding system, the banding system where we have five bands because of the special schools budget. Clearly, it’s new so it’s only been in place for a short while and I mentioned the Schools Forum before.” … He referred to the Schools Forum and how questions about the banding feed into the Schools Forum. |
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Ed – 1st update: Everything below this has gone a bit wrong (table wise) below this point. I’m working on fixing it! 2nd update: Fixed (11:36 13/8/14) 3rd update 3:55 pm removed duplicate cell in column 1 (above)
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Councillor Dave Mitchell: Will the petition from “Will that include the decisions made by Council which were fully supported by all parties?” All 3 parties fully supported it and decided not to close Lyndale “I think that’s a very important issue, it should actually be highlighted. It was a notice of motion to Council and it was fully supported by the local authority at that time.” |
David Armstrong: No, it would just include references to previous reports. Julia Hassall: This is a new consultation. “We did make clear reference to that to my recollection at the call in.” |
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Lyndale school is a fabulous resource inside |
Phil Ward: “Thank you for that point.” |
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Is it 5 or 10 places in Stanley School, it is |
The new building was built to accommodate a higher number of pupils. The number of extra places will depend on the needs of the children David Armstrong: “The school’s brand new and what we learnt when the Lyndale School was built was looking at primary schools. We built them absolutely tight on the existing campus. We found that the schools became more popular and also you’re building something for fifty or sixty years. We’re building something for fifty or sixty years, so we’re building to a generous standard and the new style that was built to a generous standard. The school, the school that we’re building had a capacity of ninety pupils. The new building is capable of taking a hundred and ten and the reason for that is that we’ll be building to the maximum standards in place, we’re building some spare capacity because we’re investing several million pounds for the next couple of years.” |
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Are there any PMLD children at Stanley School at the present time? |
No, but there are some children with PMLD at Elleray Park David Armstrong: “The school was built to take the full range of PMLD.” |
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I have visited Stanley School and I would be petrified to leave my child there.
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Both Head Teachers are confident that they can safely integrate your children into their school. Across the country there are many Phil Ward thanked her for her point.
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Has anyone spoken to Paediatricians or |
Phil Ward: “Sorry I can’t speak for paediatricians, but surely the point… No they have not, no is the answer to that.”
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What is going to happen if there are growing |
This is something which we have to manage all the time. We need to keep Phil Ward said the question had come up a number of times and the answer was that Wirral Council has a responsibility on specialist provision. When there was evidence that the numbers were growing in any particular category then they would start discussions with schools to plan places.
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In your special arrangements to provide an up |
We have asked our Principal Educational Psychologist to ensure that we have an up to date picture of each child and their needs. She understands each child and if we know the needs of each child, this will help to drive our future provision Julia Hassall “This is why we’ve got our principal educational psychologist pulling together a group of meetings with the key |
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What about Councillor Chris Carubia: However nobody had mentioned Foxfield School before? |
This is a secondary school; children come into this school at aged 11. One of the options mentioned in the consultation document is a 2 to 19 provision. We are looking at Foxfield School as an option as parents have asked us to. Also it is important to remember that if we close Lyndale we will have a discussion about each child and parents can state their preference for any school |
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How come at Stanley only 90% is funded, She said that there were ten children at the school [Stanley] that were not funded and would this be sorted out if the Lyndale School children went to Stanley School? |
Annually there is a census for each Andrew Roberts replied, “In terms of places at special schools, those decisions are taken annually. So the schools take it at a point in time, the decision taken in respect of Stanley was taken last November as a census. Clearly we need to be reviewing, as do the number of places at other special schools.” |
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We gained public support when we fund raised £80,000 for the sensory garden, This There is an amphitheatre; do you know who built it? It was the YTS lads from Wirral Action |
Phil Ward: “We don’t know” David Armstrong: “I don’t know.” David Armstrong: “I can’t know every detail.” No |
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Ian Lewis 4 years ago officers put forward a “If in four years time that’s [Lyndale] still here, who’s to say it won’t be viable?” |
Kingsway remains a small school which limits its budget income and there is David Armstrong “In Kingsway, we haven’t gone back, but at some point there’s a Council resolution to go back and revisit Kingsway.”
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Elleray and Stanley school do not |
The Head Teachers of both schools are |
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Ian Lewis 5 years ago at a full council meeting |
Julia Hassall The “No, no the significant difference Ian now to five years ago, is the government have changed the funding formula. So Lyndale is |
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I have an issue in relation to the banding of our children. I accept that they all have different needs but my worry is that my child who is on band 4 is getting £8,000 less than others on a band 5 but what will happen at Stanley School? We do not think that this will work as my son needs 1 to 1 care as although my son can feed himself he also needs to be fed as well. |
Andrew Roberts: The banding is a new system and only came into being on 1st April 2014. David Armstrong The question about whether your child is on the right band needs to be fed in to their annual review. You can also take this up with the Principal Educational Psychologist. Julia Hassall said, “Can I just add one other bit, I think it’s important to feed that in through the psychologist when the meetings are taking place as well.” |
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If the banding was changed would that keep the school open? |
David Armstrong: |
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In relation to the National Funding, Local “decided to do away with this system, which you know because it was easier, The difficulty is that by the time you go to the Schools Forum to change this system, Lyndale will be closed |
(no response given) |
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