An Angus parent has expressed his ”relief” after winning a ‘David v Goliath’ battle to save his children’s school.
Leader of Muirfield Action Group (MAG) Ewan Smith said he felt ”no sense of victory or jubilation” despite playing a pivotal role in the downfall of Angus Council’s proposal to shut Muirfield and Timmergreens primaries in Arbroath, in favour of a new £8 million building.
A long campaign of research and freedom of information requests saw the campaigner pinpoint flaw after flaw in the authority’s handling of the project, exposing consultation failures, email response discrepancies, controversial changes to school ratings and a lack of consideration on road safety.
The effort paid off this week when Education Secretary Michael Russell called a halt to Angus Council’s plans (link).
Mr Smith, who has a son and a daughter at Muirfield, said he was relieved the Scottish Government had turned the merger down, after holding what he called a ”thorough and detailed investigation”.
He added: ”I’m also pleased that all our concerns over the surveyor reports which were both mentioned in initial call-in requests and further highlighted when the information commission report was published in December have been validated.
”Clearly, Muirfield is not the worst conditioned school in Arbroath. That is a fact written down in black and white and the misrepresentation of this was used as an argument to close a superbly well-run and welcoming school. Timmergreens was also let down by surveyor reports with gradings being altered without reason.”
Mr Smith went on to claim that the MAG campaign was not the voice of a lone individual, but the community coming together to ”stand up for what they believe in”.
”This kind of practice cannot be allowed to happen ever again when a school is put forward for closure by our council,” he said. ”If there is any good to come of this then it’s that we have shown that people power can impact on major decisions.”
”What we cannot allow to happen now is for the council to take the huff and refuse to spend the £8 million they pledged on the Arbroath Schools Project to go elsewhere.”
The council must now decide whether to take costly legal action against the Scottish Government’s decision.
Mr Smith said everyone involved in the long-running saga recognised that Arbroath schools needed investment, but demanded parents’ views should be heard.
He said: ”We don’t want any children shivering in classrooms because the heating doesn’t work or crammed into over-crowded schools. Equally, we don’t want ill-conceived ideas railroaded through without proper consultation of the community.”