King Alfred - shortfall in school places warn Greens
23 March 2007
Green councillors are warning of a shortfall in school places if the controversial King Alfred plans get the go-ahead today (23 March).
Details released in the Brighton and Hove City Council council report on the proposals (see below) reveal that the Council has requested £1.2m for extra primary, secondary and sixth form places.
However the applicants have only offered £400,000 - claiming that the scheme wouldn’t be viable if the requested amount was paid.
Green convenor Cllr Keith Taylor explained, “There are no spare primary schools places in Hove, and the two schools in the recently agreed secondary pupil catchment area for King Alfred are already predicted to be at full capacity.
“There are simply no places for the new King Alfred residents to send their children to – and that is why the Council asked for £1.2m.
“To me, offering a third of the requested cash and pleading the sums don’t add up suggests the developer’s priorities need to be looked at again.”
“Green councillors have already suggested the project’s size should be reduced by locating some housing off-site, and this could possibly help the education provision as well”
“The majority of Green councillors believe there are simply too many elements of these plans that still need working out properly to give it the go-ahead this week”
Notes to editors:
For further information please call Geoffrey Bowden Brighton and Hove Green Party Press Officer on 07958 682 683.1. Extract from council officer’s report
Education contribution
The council’s Children, Families and Schools team have requested a financial contribution from the developer of £1,209,105 towards education infrastructure, based on £486,749 for primary education, £637,168 for secondary education and £85,188 for sixth form education.
However, it is understood that there is a surplus of secondary and sixth form school places in the city and as such, given the viability issues associated with this development (discussed earlier) it is considered acceptable that no contribution is sought for secondary and sixth form places.
But there is no spare capacity for primary school places within Hove and it is not considered acceptable for primary age school children to have to travel to the east part of the city primary schools which do have places. Therefore the applicant has offered a sum of £400,000 to contribute to primary education and to address policies SU15 and QD28 of the Brighton & Hove Local Plan, policies S1, S3 and S4 of the Structure Plan, policy Q6 of Regional Planning Guidance for the South East and policies CC5, H2, H3, BE1, S5 and SCT9 of the draft South East Plan.”
(When this extract talks about spare secondary & sixth form capacity, it doesn’t state that all spare places are well outside Hove!)
Full version or report available at http://www.brighton-hove.gov.uk/index.cfm?request=c1107341&action=committee&comm_view=detail&name=Planning%20Applications%20Sub%2DCommittee
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