Concerns over scrutiny as Central Beds Council agrees school organisation plan

Marcel Coiffait was responding to a scrutiny committee chairman’s concerns three agenda items on the same agenda of the local authority’s executive were bypassing due process.

Conservative Heath and Reach councillor Mark Versallion warned: “There’s a factual, legal, quasi-regulatory obligation for executive to work with scrutiny.

“You managed it for the first 12 months or so, but it’s very regrettable recently you’re consistently excluding scrutiny from the process.”

Chief executive Marcel Coiffait replied: “Effective scrutiny is part of democratic process and there’s room for improvement in that space.

“I’d urge everyone to work out how we can have a more effective and positive relationship to enable scrutiny to really make a difference over outcomes for residents.”

The issue was raised under consideration of a new CBC five-year school organisation plan 2025 to 2030, setting out a strategy to ensure every child has access to high-quality school places now and in the future.

“This plan will carefully assess school capacity across the region, analysing challenges, such as demographic changes, new housing developments and the ongoing transition from a three- to two-tier education system,” said a CBC statement.

“It also supports the expansion of special educational needs (SEN) school places within communities and sets out how we meet the needs of families across Central Bedfordshire.

“Through careful area-by-area planning, we’ll provide new classrooms where required and repurpose surplus accommodation where necessary. We also pledge to work more closely with school leaders on place planning, so their expertise shapes future decisions.”

Independent Leighton Linslade West councillor Steve Owen explained: “There’s a desire in children’s services to find ways of accelerating the transition from three- to two-tier education locally.

“The other driver is the recent change in government guidance on forecast birth rates, which have dropped by 30 per cent. Those two aspects have caused us to examine the implications school-by-school.

“In places where there isn’t new house building, there’ll be spare places, then classrooms and eventually schools. Some would see it as a threat, or as an opportunity to repurpose those spaces possibly as additional resource provision (ARPs) to make the transition easier and less costly.

“A plan will be brought to this committee and full council ahead of the budget round next year, so that we find a set of priorities in delivering those two capital programmes.”

Independent Leighton Linslade West councillor Victoria Harvey referred to a problem in Leighton Buzzard where the new housing is on the east while many lower schools and secondary school places are in the west, leading to “a vast amount of congestion” in the town.

Executive member for children’s services councillor Owen described the cross town traffic in Leighton Buzzard as being the result of parental choice being exercised, and has been evident for 40 years.

Conservative Cranfield and Marston Moretaine councillor Sue Clark was disappointed to hear there would be “no more about three- to two-tier” until the autumn, saying: “It seems a long time since there was any significant progress on the outstanding clusters or the half done Shefford and Stotfold.”

The executive agreed the school organisation plan strategy for 2025 to 2030, following a recent public consultation exercise.