Residents of north Kingston voiced their anger at council proposals to create an eight form "superschool" into their part of the borough, when they confronted council officers at the Hawker Centre on Wednesday.
Mock-ups of a proposed five-storey building at the North Kingston Centre were booed and jeered at by a packed out hall of residents, parents and teachers, who accused the council for trying to solve the whole borough’s education problems with the new school in the north.
Despite a 10-year campaign from local parents demanding a new secondary school for the north of the borough, residents were appalled at the size of the proposed building - calling for a smaller four to six form entry school to be built instead.
Much bile was also directed at the selective Tiffin Girls’ School, which takes 60 per cent of its pupils from outside the borough and has refused repeated calls to admit more children from the local area.
Others questioned the sanity of providing places for 3,500 children along a 350m stretch of road, while there were gasps of amazement when it was admitted that there was nothing to stop Richmond children applying for places at the new school.
Chairing the meeting, Kingston Council’s director of education Patrick Leeson suffered frequent interruptions from irate parents as he tried to explain council plans for the new school, which would house 1,200 pupils at the North Kingston Centre and a sixth form and community recreational space at the Hawker Centre.
He said: "There are clearly views this evening that building a big school on this site will be disproportionate, and I hear that.
"This is not simply providing places for the rest of the borough. I think we will be going away from this meeting tonight looking at (the issue of size) very carefully."
Mr Leeson confirmed services currently provided at the two sites, which include adult education, local history archives and leisure facilities, would be relocated in "one or more locations" nearby - although the details are yet to be decided.
One of the best received ideas from the public, in what was often a bad-tempered meeting, was a call to move Fern Hill Primary School to the Hawker Centre, freeing up land to construct the new school and sixth form on one site.
Responding to the anger aimed at Tiffin Girls’ School, Mr Leeson said he understood people’s frustrations, but said the Government’s rules on selective schools meant the council was powerless to force the issue.
He added that although there had been serious consideration into moving Tiffin Girls’ School to a smaller site elsewhere, it was seen to be too expensive and said dialogue was taking place into the school sharing its sports facilities with other children.
The new school will be built under a Private Finance Initiative scheme, which the council hopes to fund with money from the Government’s Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme.
Such a scheme would mean a private firm would construct, own and maintain the buildings, while the council would be responsible for educational standards.
Mr Leeson said: "The money is there, there’s absolutely no question about the funding.
"We have been given a clear indication by Government we will be in BSF by 2010."
Residents can have their say on the proposals by visiting kingston.gov.uk/secondary_expansion before the consultation finishes on August 17.
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