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New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2016 5:33 pm
by iain
North Ayrshire Council hope to build a new school for children with additional needs, which will replace the various additional needs schools dotted around the local area. If this represents an improvement in the quality of education and care received by additional needs pupils, then I applaud the Council for deciding to spend more money this way (OK, they’re not actually spending more money, because the Council admits that the centralisation of the various additional needs schools will result in the Council spending hundreds of thousand of pounds less on additional needs children!).

This new school is going to be built, it’s just a question of where. NAC had originally identified 10 possible locations for the school, but they decided, without proper public consultation, to choose ‘Auchenharvie’ as the location. Various employees of the Council have been explicit about the fact that the school is planned for the PLAYINGFIELDS at Auchenharvie. Officially, the Council is pretending not to know where at Auchenharvie the school will be built. This pretence is presumably designed to rob the community of the chance to object early and effectively to the destruction of their town’s sporting facilities.

Another unfortunate tactic they’ve used to discourage the community from objecting to locating the new build on playing fields is to ask a ridiculously leading consultation question. They ask:

‘It is proposed that a new Additional Support Needs School (for children and young people aged 2-18 years) be built, at a site, adjacent to Auchenharvie Academy, Saltcoats Road, Stevenston. Do you agree with the above proposal?’

Instead, there are really two questions that they should be asking: 1) do you think a new additional needs school should be built and 2) should we build it on playingfields in Stevenston. They’ve purposefully conflated the two questions to make it difficult for the community to object to their playing fields being developed. That is, the Council has implicitly framed the whole consultation as a discussion on whether a new additional needs school should be built (a proposition everyone would agree with). In reality, it’s simply a debate about whether a new school should be built on playingfields or a new school should be built in a different, more socially sensitive location (after all, there are 9 other suitable sites for the school identified by the Council).

This is statistically one of most deprived areas in Scotland, North Ayrshire has more obese kids than anywhere else in Scotland and North Ayrshire is consistently identified by empirical research as having the worst quality of life in UK. Destroying sporting facilities in such an area is just perverse. And the particularly sickening thing is that destroying community playing fields is in large part just a way for the Council to save money (they own the land already, so they don’t need to buy it before building the school).

The online consultation runs until 4th November. By ticking a box, those who support the school being built on the playing fields at Auchenharvie can ‘agree’ and those who support it being built elsewhere can ‘disagree’. A small ‘comments’ box is provided if respondents want to elaborate on their response.

http://www.north-ayrshire.gov.uk/counci ... ision.aspx

Re: New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Fri Sep 30, 2016 6:56 pm
by stivis
Without reading the document in depth , two things initially , Why not build on the old Kerlaw site?
Although NAC might have sold that to Glasgow City Council years ago, and it's now earmarked that for housing By NAC or GCC( in GCC's case to a private developer NAC's case Private Developer or for social housing)
I wonder about posting details to Govan Law Centre

The document in general seems a bit dressed up, but limited in information

Re: New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Sun Oct 02, 2016 10:45 am
by sweet caroline
Yes I agree it is not fair to build the school at Auchenharvie. Was that not one of the reasons they argued with for the new St. Andrews School being built, that playing fields were still available at Auchenharvie.
In saying that I agree a new Support School is needed in North Ayrshire.

SC

Re: New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Wed Oct 05, 2016 12:53 pm
by chef
The whole build on or not build on the playing fields, thereby fuelling the socio- health debate is an irrelevance in my eyes,The proximity of the main road and the safety of all the children . not just the special needs children is paramount,.this cannot be guaranteed if the school is built in this area. A better venue would be at the existing James Reid school which could be enlarged /amalgamated with Mayfield primary school

Re: New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Wed Oct 05, 2016 4:25 pm
by sweet caroline
Should be on a main bus route, as those roads are kept clearer in Winter road conditions.

SC

Re: New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Wed Oct 05, 2016 7:14 pm
by aland
dont nac have previous for ripping up playing fields, laighdykes for st matthews and stanley park for the new stanley primary. wonder now that labour are back in the majority if it will be another PFI project that we will be paying for forever

Re: New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Wed Oct 05, 2016 8:29 pm
by stivis
They'll try it, look at the carry on in Edinburgh, where the BBC kept stumm about who instigated the PFI (or PPI ) scheme under Clunkie and McConnel

The cost of this funding is £30Billion per Annum from 1999 on More if you count the Skye Bridge
As Joe Friday is report to have said that's "Just the facts, ma'am".
I think that Financial option has gone away ( It is never done in Canada or Australia much like Wonga companies) due to the SNP and the Greens

A problem is that if NAC build , I tend to favour Kerlaw for so many reasons, but that the coffers won't be topped up if they flog the old redundant sites to developers for private housing, that said there would be a potential for Social Housing on those sites, I doubt they would be bright enough to do Passive Housing, Of course they would never consider Passive Schools .There is a bit of a problem with that . It's a situation that GARL highlighted by the action of Archie Graham

Re: New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Wed Oct 05, 2016 9:17 pm
by morag
What is an additional needs school? For children with poorer mental or physical ability..both?

Re: New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Wed Oct 05, 2016 9:25 pm
by stivis
It can be either one or It can be a combination of both which I think in this case given all the schools involved it is

Re: New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Tue Nov 29, 2016 8:12 am
by 5siamese7
I see they are test boring in the football park not far from Boglemart street but at the base of the escarpment. So if suitable a football field will be lost. I wonder if there will be any objections?

Re: New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Tue Nov 29, 2016 10:59 am
by John Donnelly
They are absolutely mad if they are planning to build a school at the Stevenston end of Auchenharvie, which will likely mean access in the Boglemart area.
The road is narrow there and the wee hill could cause visibility problems for traffic coming out of the town.

JD.

Re: New additional needs school - destruction of Auchenharvie playing fields

Posted: Tue Nov 29, 2016 12:39 pm
by 5siamese7
John Donnelly wrote:They are absolutely mad if they are planning to build a school at the Stevenston end of Auchenharvie, which will likely mean access in the Boglemart area.
The road is narrow there and the wee hill could cause visibility problems for traffic coming out of the town.

JD.
John if it goes ahead there, the access road will probably be the same one for the academy.