County Council caught out misleading Assembly Minister.

Carmarthenshire County Council has been caught out attempting to mislead the Assembly Education Minister over it’s controversial strategy to close dozens of Welsh-medium village primary schools. In a personally-signed letter to Cymdeithas yr Iaith officials, Assembly Minister Jane Davidson says that there is no cause for concern as the County Council are in the process of consulting and inviting opinions about their Modernising Educational Provision Strategy.

On the other hand the Council’s own Director of Education and Deputy Leader – in other correspondence with Cymdeithas yr Iaith – have made it perfectly clear that they have no intention whatsoever of allowing consultation, democratic discussion, nor a vote in Chamber about the new strategy and that any consultation will be confined to the details of specific closure proposals for individual schools at some time in the future.

Jane Davidson’s (The Welsh Assembly Education Minister) Letter

Jane Davidson says, in a letter dated 21/12 to Cymdeithas Chair in Carmarthen, Sioned Elin:

“The Authority is currently holding a consultation about the Strategy and has invited all interested bodies and institutions to send in their comments. Following this general consultation, if the Authority decides to go forward with individual proposals, then they will be required to seek the approval of the Executive Board before holding a full local consultation.”

Sioned Elin commented,

“We totally agree with Jane Davidson that this should be the correct procedure. Our 5000-names petition presented to Council last month called for such a 6-month period of countywide consultation about the whole principles underpinning the strategy before moving ahead to individual proposals. The Council have however totally rejected this and are determined to prevent any consultation or discussion, or vote in chamber, about the Strategy or underlying principles. They maintain that the general policy paper - passed 3 years ago - which stated that “there would inevitably be fewer schools” gives them a blank cheque to draw up proposals to close as many schools as they wish with no discussion on a strategic level. Their letters (listed below) to us confirm that any consultation will be limited to the statutory minimum of consulting about the details of individual closures at some time in the future. “

Alun Davies’ (The Director of Education for Carmarthenshire) Letter

Alun Davies in a letter dated the previous day 20/12 to Cymdeithas Education Spokesperson Ffred Ffransis states:

”You should be assured that there will be full and extensive consultation at the appropriate times on all individual proposals.”

Coun Martin Morris’ (Deputy Council Leader and Labour Group Leader) Letter

Martin Morris in an e-mail this week to Cymdeithas Education spokesperson Ffred Ffransis) makes the point even more clearly,

“The consultation will be just as you suggest purely on in individual proposal for closure. There will not be any consultation on the underlying principles as they were agreed in 2001.”

Misleading the Welsh Assembly’s Education Minister

Ffred Ffransis commented:

“This letter directly contradicts the Education Minister’s assurances to us. I am certain that she would not have deliberately misled us, and therefore she in turn must have been misled and given false promises by the Council. The Council’s strategy is also completely contrary to the Assembly’s own guidelines on small schools as these guidelines specifically say that:

• Authorities must investigate all alternatives to closures. There is not the slightest attempt to do this in this strategy. In every case mentioned the same proposal is made of closing village schools and setting up a centralised Area School.
• Authorities must evaluate the effect of closures on local communities. There is not a single sentence in the strategy about this.
• Authorities must place educational considerations foremost. Yet Carmarthenshire recognise that the education provided by these schools is excellent and the whole strategy is based on buildings and real estate.
• Authorities must consider the effect on the Welsh Language. Yet, at a stroke, this strategy erases the whole Welsh Language Education Plan – based on Category-A Welsh-medium village schools as the norm.

“For all these reasons, and in view of the way in which the Council has tried to conceal the truth from her, we have asked Ms Davidson to publicly warn the Council that she would not accept any closure proposals based upon such a strategy and to persuade the Council to embark upon the democratic consultation about the whole strategy as she herself believed they were doing”.

Further Information:

• For further info, or faxed copies of these letters, please contact Ffred Ffransis on 01559-384378
• Further campaign info on website www.cadwneinhysgolion.com
• Meeting will be held on Jan13th to set up a Village-Based County Forum to fight against the strategy.