Richmond Inclusive Schools Campaign

The Council of the London Borough of Richmond are responsible to all the people of the borough for ensuring the best possible schools are provided, given the available funds. There is a growing shortage of good quality secondary school places in the borough. Sites are hard to find and money is tight. But instead of proposing excellent, inclusive schools, the Council is proposing to offer the first and only site so far available (Clifden Road, Twickenham) to the Catholic Church for a Voluntary Aided Catholic school - that means a school that will be effectively closed to 90% of the borough who are non-Catholics*, but open to children of Catholics from other boroughs. We want to change that.

There are a lot of us: 3367 local people signed our petition asking the Council "to ensure that every state-funded school opening in the borough from now on is inclusive, so that no child can be denied a place in a good local school because of the religion or belief of their parents". That's a huge number for a local petition, especially when we're not backed by any schools, churches or other large organisations.

Click here to be kept informed about the campaign and to share any comments or ideas. We promise to keep your name and email strictly confidential. You can also join our Facebook group "Richmond Inclusive Schools Campaign". Everyone is welcome, including fair-minded Catholics. The campaign is not anti-religious or party political.

COUNCIL PROPOSALS VIOLATE NEW EDUCATION ACT?

We have written to Richmond Council pointing out that their proposals for Catholic Voluntary Aided schools on the Clifden Road site appear to violate the new Education Act 2011. That puts them in the untenable position of consulting borough residents on a plan that doesn't comply with the law. Click here for our press release explaining the issue. They have replied agreeing that the new law is now in force but claiming that they are still allowed to accept proposals for Voluntary Aided schools. More to come, meanwhile, make sure you complete the consultation.....

COUNCIL CONSULTATION - HAVE YOUR SAY BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE

The Council is running a consultation on their proposal to use the site for a (150 places/year) Catholic secondary school, plus a small (30 places/year) Catholic primary. If you're interested in fairness, make sure you complete the short on-line survey here on the Council website, which also provides their consultation document. And please pass this link to any other supporters you know http://tinyurl.com/rcschool-lbrut. This decision will affect the borough for decades to come. The consultation is only happening because of the pressure we applied in 2011. So it's important to take the opportunity. It runs until 16th March. (Why not do it now?)

Things to bear in mind if you read the Council's consultation document

Admissions: The latest proposal from the Diocese is available here. It's very misleading on admissions, claiming there will be "up to 150 community places". The only inclusive places proposed are 10 of the 30 places/year at the primary school. These 10 children (some of whom are likely to be children of Catholics of course) will have priority if they apply to the secondary. But the secondary has 150 places a year and it will take 7 years for the first of these children to reach age 11. No direct community places are proposed for the secondary. 100% of the places at the secondary are expected to be occupied by children of Catholics until 2020, when it might drop to a minimum of 93%. This is a token gesture, at least at secondary level - essentially, if you're not a Catholic, your children won't get in. (We've no idea how they worked out the "up to 150".)
Options: Voluntary Aided Catholic schools are not the only viable option for the site. For example, the New Local School for Twickenham group of parents is proposing a full-scale inclusive secondary "free school" with a science & engineering specialism. It now has the support of a major education trust and is urgently seeking interested parents to sign-up (there's an important deadline coming up in February). RISC isn't behind the proposals, but they powerfully illustrate that, even without the Council seeking inclusive options, they are available. Click here for details.
School capacity: The Council claims the only need for more secondary school capacity in the borough is for a Catholic school. They say that an inclusive school on the Clifden Road site would threaten the development of the three existing Academies, where there are currently spare places. That's very convenient for a Council trying to justify giving prioirty to a Catholic school. But it's wrong. By basing their figures on a lot of dodgy assumptions, they're taking a huge risk that they'll run out of capacity - and other experts agree with us. Click here for our Briefing on Richmond's Secondary School Plans along with the calculations.
We can't understand why they have such little confidence in the academies that they want to force non-Catholic children into them by denying the choice of a new inclusive alternative.
Cost: The Council's consultation document claims "The local Catholic community would meet almost all the costs of providing the proposed high-quality Catholic secondary school." This is simply untrue. The Council is paying an undisclosed sum (thought to be around £10 million) for the site and existing buildings, which it proposes to give to the church on a 125 year lease more or less for nothing. The Catholic Church will indeed pay the one-off cost of converting them to a secondary school (around £7.5 million). After that, the normal rules for Voluntary Aided schools will apply: the taxpayer will pay 100% of the running costs and 90% of the capital costs. But the church will get a permanent majority on the govering body, which among other things will set the admissions policy - effectively a private school for children of Catholics at taxpayers' expense. For 125 years. It's a fantastic deal for the church, and a terrible deal for the taxpayer.

Why an inclusive school would be better for the borough:

Fair admissions: this is the most important point. In inclusive schools, admissions are equally open to all children, regardless of the religion or beliefs of their parents. We think it's simply wrong to set up a new state-funded school that will turn away local children because of the religion or belief of their parents.
Catholic Voluntary Aided schools set their own admissions policies. All existing Catholic VA schools* they have one thing in common: they always give priority to Catholic families over non-Catholics, even to Catholics living many miles away over non-Catholics living next door to the school. That's in line with the Catholic Diocese of Westminster's view that: "Catholic schools exist to assist parents in handing on the Catholic faith to their children". But around 90% of the residents of Richmond are not Catholics.
*The preliminary proposals from the church are for "up to" 10 of the 30 places at the primary school to be available on a non-denominational basis using distance from the school. After 7 years, in 2020, the first cohort of 10 such children - which is likely to include children of Catholics - will be given priority if they want to go to the secondary. None of the 150 places per year at the secondary school will be directly available on a non-denominational basis, unless there are spare places (which everyone agrees is highly unlikely). So even if all 10 of these children are non-Catholic, and if all decide to go on to the secondary in 2020, children of Catholics will still comprise over 93% of the secondary intake. And for the first 7 years it will be 100%.

Fair employment: inclusive schools can select and employ the best teachers, regardless of their religion or beliefs, or lifestyle.
Catholic schools set their own employment policies and are exempt from key equalities legislation. The Catholic Education Service not only asks that Heads, Deputy Heads and Heads of RE should be practising Catholics, but also that schools should favour committed Catholics for other teaching posts. And if you're an excellent teacher who's in a gay relationship, you're unlikely even to seek a position in an institution that considers homosexual activity to be sinful. [In a recent case, a popular headmaster at a Catholic school had to resign because he had divorced and planned to re-marry - see here]

Fair curriculum: good inclusive schools teach a fair and balanced syllabus for education about religious and non-religious beliefs. They respect the fact that some parents have sincerely-held religious convictions, and teach children mutual understanding and tolerance as they work together. [And, of course, parents remain free to take their children to places of worship, to send them to religious classes outside school and to run their homes in line with their beliefs.]
In a Catholic school, the Religious Education syllabus is set by the Church, and RE teaching is inspected by the Church, not by Ofsted.

Quality: this is not an issue about quality. There are excellent faith schools and excellent inclusive schools. The two secondary schools in the Borough of Richmond judged "outstanding" by Ofsted are both community schools.

Community cohesion: we live in a plural society in which there is considerable religious diversity. Nationally, half the population is not religious. Segregating children by the religion of their parents can do nothing to assist mutual tolerance and understanding across the community.

There's already one state-funded Christian faith school in the borough, where Catholics are favoured over non-Christians in admissions. And there's a Catholic fee-paying school. But there is no "right" for anyone to be provided with taxpayer-funded schooling in order to hand on their particular faith. Most other taxpayers would consider that an unfair privilege, even though it is within the law.

We believe the great majority of people in the local community want any new taxpayer-funded schools in the borough to be excellent inclusive schools and do not want a new Catholic Voluntary Aided school.

info@richmondinclusiveschools.org.uk

Set up and backed by local people. Supported by The Accord Coalition http://accordcoalition.org.uk whose members and supporters include Ekklesia (the Christian think tank), the General Assembly of Unitarian and Free Christian Churches, a number of prominent Anglican churchmen and women, the Runnymede Trust, British Muslims for Secular Democracy, the Hindu Academy, the British Humanist Association and many others. The Chair of Accord is Rabbi Jonathan Romain.