Schools (North-east Fife)
The final item of business is a members' business debate on motion S3M-4110, in the name of Ted Brocklebank, on the new secondary school for north-east Fife. The debate will be concluded without any question being put.
Motion debated,
That the Parliament believes that the children, parents and communities of Tay Bridgehead in north-east Fife require a new secondary school and community facility in addition to the proposed single site at Madras College; highlights that the campaign for a new Tay Bridgehead school has been ongoing for more than half a century; considers, in light of recent leaked figures, that the proposed new Madras College will not be big enough to accommodate all the pupils, including those from the Tay Bridgehead area; notes that currently around 850 pupils from the Tay Bridgehead and Leuchars area have to be bussed to school and that this has affected their education and involvement in school activities, as has been the case for generations; congratulates The Courier, Fife Herald and St Andrews Citizen for highlighting the growing public support for a Tay Bridgehead school, and supports all those involved in the campaign.
During the recess I was fortunate enough to be in that most Scottish of New Zealand cities, Dunedin. When I visited the country's oldest university, Otago, I was greeted by a nonagenarian former member of the university staff who wanted to know whether I was the boy from Madras. I am not sure what pleased me most—the accolade "boy" or the fact that this wonderful old lady had, like me, been educated at Madras college in St Andrews. She told me of other former pupils who are doing well in Australasia, including the recently retired chancellor of the University of Sydney, who turned out to be my former next door neighbour when I was growing up in St Andrews, wee Gavin Brown—another Gavin Brown.
It is no mystery to those of us who are lucky enough to attend Madras that our local high school should bear the name of an Indian city; we all know that a local lad of pairts, Andrew Bell, made his siller with the East India Company in Madras and chose to endow a place of learning in his home town. Madras and Bell Baxter in Cupar—also founded by Andrew Bell—have among the highest pupil rolls in Scotland. Each day around 850 pupils are bussed from Fife's Tayside communities—most are bussed to Madras but some are bussed to Bell Baxter, which is described as already being at 101 per cent capacity. The journey for pupils who come from the outlying villages of Balmerino and Gauldry can take up to 90 minutes each way—that is three hours added to the school day. The taxpayer picks up the transportation costs, which are now approaching £1 million per annum.
For more than half a century, as I can personally testify, there has been a campaign to site a separate secondary school at the Tay bridgehead. In a recent poll on a local newspaper website, 67 per cent of the responses were in favour of a Tay bridgehead school.
Will the member take an intervention on that point?
Not at this stage. The member will have ample time to reply to all the points. I will try to let him in later if I have time.
Some might recall that I introduced a members' business debate on plans for a bridgehead school shortly after I became a member of the Parliament in 2003. At that time, Fife Council was controlled by Labour, and I received support from Tricia Marwick and the constituency member, Iain Smith. Mr Smith said:
"I certainly do not need Ted Brocklebank to tell me about the need for a new school for north Fife, as I have been campaigning for one for many years."—[Official Report, 4 June 2003; c 394.]
In his Lib Dem campaign material for the 2003 and 2007 Scottish parliamentary elections, Iain Smith claimed that his number 1 priority was
"New secondary schools for St Andrews and the Tay Bridgehead."
That was his number 1 priority, no less. I have examples of the pamphlets that he put out at that time.
Mr Smith waxed even more enthusiastic when his party went into coalition with the Scottish National Party in Fife Council. On 17 May 2007, he welcomed the new political alliance and urged it
"to give priority to the need for a new secondary school which serves the Tay Bridgehead area and for a single site Madras College."
However, that was then and this is now.
Members' business debates are, by tradition, consensual, and I am trying very hard to be consensual, but it is difficult if members display all the consistency of a blancmange when it comes to living up to pre-election promises. Early in the new administration, the SNP-Lib Dem coalition on Fife Council decided that declining pupil numbers meant that there was no longer a need for a bridgehead school, so Mr Smith had to change his tune, and quickly. He says that events have moved on significantly. In a recent interview in The Courier, he claimed that he was surprised that tonight's members' business motion was even considered appropriate. What surprised him, I believe, was that some parties actually stick to their election promises.
Let us consider whether events have moved on significantly. Fife Council certainly seems set on a single-site school to replace the current Madras college on South Street. The council estimates that the new school will have a roll of 1,342 pupils, which is 300 or so short of the present figure but still 350 more than the 1,000 pupils who attend top-achieving schools such as Cults academy, Banchory academy and Boroughmuir high school, which are second, fourth and ninth respectively in the school national league tables.
How accurate are the council's future pupil estimates? Significantly, education officials have always placed qualifications on their school roll projections, advising that they should be treated with "considerable caution". Perhaps that is because a leaked Lib Dem memo showed that the proposed new single-site Madras college would not have sufficient capacity to accommodate future pupil roll numbers. In other words, if population projections for north-east Fife proved wrong—and remember that the area's population has risen continuously since the war—the proposed new Madras would be over capacity before it was even built. Fife education officials' methodology appears to have been to apply national pupil roll predictions rather than to address the situation on the ground in north-east Fife. At one stage, even Iain Smith was demanding an independent assessment of the figures. Of course, that demand has quietly been dropped.
I repeatedly urged the council to wait until the local plan was published, to allow a mature judgment of how extra housing might influence pupil roll projections. Well, the finalised St Andrews and east Fife local plan has been published and the most cursory examination reveals that the estimated housing capacity for the Madras catchment area is no fewer than 1,700 new homes in the nine-year period up to 2018, with the potential for a further 835 houses. Taking the lower figure of 1,700, even if two thirds of those houses are occupied by retired or childless people, and even if we allow for only one child per household for the remainder, that still adds up to more than 500 extra youngsters who will be eligible to go to Madras within a decade. However, Fife Council argues that, somehow, we will lose about 300 pupils from the Madras roll over the same period. How can those housing figures possibly tally with the pupil roll projections?
North-east Fife parents should tell Fife Council in no uncertain terms that we require not one, but two single-site schools of about 1,000 pupils each—one to replace Madras and the other at the bridgehead.
I have yet to be convinced that a new 1,000-pupil Madras college could not be sited in an upgraded and expanded school on the present historic site in South Street. That would preserve Andrew Bell's A-listed building and go some way to satisfying the many former Madras pupils who, like me, believe that our school has been scandalously neglected by Fife Council over the years. The other option must surely be a greenfield site adjacent to the playing fields at Station park.
It would be the height of folly for the council to proceed with its present plans for a 1,342-pupil single-site school anywhere in St Andrews, if—as seems to be virtually certain—its pupil roll projections prove within a decade to be hopelessly inaccurate. That is exactly the situation in prospect, based on the housing estimates in the 2009 local plan, which everyone can study on the council website from tomorrow.
I am grateful for the opportunity to speak in this debate and I congratulate Ted Brocklebank on bringing it to the chamber. I am aware that attempts to secure a secondary school for north-east Fife go back to the 1970s and agree that the current situation, in which hundreds of pupils are bussed from Tayport and Newport to a Madras college that is split between two sides of St Andrews, leaves a lot to be desired.
I share Ted Brocklebank's affection for old school buildings since I was for a short time—just about the length of a session of Parliament, in fact—educated at Royal High school. I remember that the place was warmed by colossal coal fires, which meant that one could always recognise a Royal High master because he was the man with the burned bum, so to speak: the gowns were frayed where they had been baked against the fires. I left before the place had central heating, let alone got anywhere near the 20th century.
Fife Council's current plans to build a new Madras college largely meet with my approval, and I will explain why. In a country that for the benefit of my Conservative friends I will call Ruritania, in which I served at a university for something like 30 years, there has been much reconstruction of secondary schools. Those schools are big and have a wide range of student facilities with a particular concentration on technical subjects—and they are all on railway lines.
It does not seem to have occurred to folk that the business of bussing people rather slowly across northern Fife could be obviated by having a new railway station on what was the old branch line, very close to the site that is proposed for the new school. If we were in Ruritania, trains would leave Dundee—which has two universities, lots of schools and teaching hospitals—and run right through to St Andrews along what must be potentially the richest educational corridor in Scotland, although it is sadly neglected. Why is it that such a huge tourist resort and centre of learning has only a bus service through to Leuchars junction?
My suggestion—which in Ruritanian terms is utterly orthodox and rather boring—is that we have a train service that terminates in St Andrews, at a college centre station. We would, as we have heard, have an almost immediate subsidy of £1 million a year. In Ruritania, that type of service draws many orthodox passengers to use the railway services in rural areas and it restores a public service.
Our Minister for Schools and Skills can testify to the fact that, after much struggle and strife involving underestimates and overestimates, a railway was built through to Alloa. In place of the expected 150,000 or 160,000 passengers a year, more than 400,000 currently use that service, so it has been a whirl of a success.
Why is there not a bit of joined-up thinking on this matter? If we have a secondary school—an expanded Madras college—just outside St Andrews, it would be in an area that is rich in potential teachers. That is something from which Ted Brocklebank has undoubtedly benefited in his time. I speak as someone who grew up in a university town and who is well aware of the usual masses of excellent but relatively poorly paid teachers in such areas.
We ought to look at what we will do with the corridor between St Andrews and Dundee and the chances that we have to develop all the communities along it. We should think of a joined-up solution, which has already been shown to be successful in the case of Alloa. We should think about our schools and our transport systems at the same time.
I am a bit wary of getting in between the Conservatives and the Liberals on this, but I will give it a go.
I am happy to take part in this evening's debate, and I congratulate Ted Brocklebank on securing it, although I feel that the lack of cross-party support for his motion will be reflected in this evening's contributions. I recognise his consistency in calling for a Tay bridgehead school, and I congratulate him on highlighting the issue for those who are involved in the campaign. It is good that we have members' business debates to highlight issues about which local people are passionate.
I suspect that Mr Brocklebank's motivation in this debate is as much to have a pop at the Liberals in Fife as anything else—or even to have a pop at Iain Smith, although I am sure that he can speak for himself. However, Mr Brocklebank is right to say that, prior to the most recent local government elections, the Liberals in Fife campaigned for two schools in north-east Fife. They made promises that they have abandoned now that they are in power in Fife with the Scottish National Party.
It is regrettable that members' business debates about Fife always seem more suited to the cut and thrust of Thursday mornings than to Thursday tea times, but education in Fife is a concern. The rate of progress from the local authority on improving Fife schools and undertaking new builds is woeful—it has been far too slow. If there was more progress on Madras college, the needs of secondary pupils in the Tay bridgehead area would be better met.
I appreciate that Ted Brocklebank made a persuasive argument for a new school in the bridgehead area, and Fife Council did not help itself with the fiasco over the leaked figures, but there are questions to answer about having two new-build schools in the north-east. Where will the money come from? Some £40 million has been committed to a new Madras college, there is a pressing need for a new school in Kirkcaldy, and there are far too many C condition schools in Fife that need to be improved. A new school in the Tay bridgehead area is financially unachievable.
House building and community expansion is planned for St Andrews and Cupar, which is where the majority of the pupil numbers will be and where the resources must be focused.
I appreciate that there are real issues with transport and that parents will often appreciate having a school close to their home, but there must be other considerations in the provision of secondary education. We expect our modern secondary schools to be able to offer choice in the curriculum, such as a range of languages, drama and the sciences, all of which an improved single-site Madras college, with links to the University of St Andrews, could offer. It is debatable whether a smaller high school could deliver the same variety and breadth and the opportunities that pupils and parents expect.
Although having a school nearby has its attractions, it is not the only factor in a decision about where a young person goes to school. In parts of Fife we already have fairly active use of placing requests at secondary level. We have to question whether travel would be the most pressing concern for parents and young people when choosing between a school with an established reputation, a wide range of courses and a modern environment and an untested school offering more limited educational choices. The issue of locality is different for secondary pupils and primary pupils. We must deliver the highest level of education for all our pupils.
The Labour Party in Fife has made no secret of the fact that we are committed to a single-site school for Madras college and that building two schools in the north-east was never realistic and is not the right solution. There is the clear potential to develop Madras college as a state-of-the-art school that is able to deliver a modern, broad education with links to one of the top universities in the world, never mind in Scotland.
It is regrettable that in nearly three years of the current Fife Council administration we have not seen the progress at Madras that is needed. Madras college needs to be a centre of excellence that will benefit pupils throughout north-east Fife. I thank Ted Brocklebank for the opportunity to discuss the issue this evening.
I am happy to participate in this debate on the important issue of secondary education in my constituency of North East Fife, and I congratulate Ted Brocklebank on securing the debate, despite the lack of cross-party support for his motion.
There is no question but that there is an urgent need to replace the current school buildings that house Madras college in St Andrews. A few years ago, a report by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Education was scathing about the standard of accommodation that pupils and teachers have to put up with. It highlighted problems caused by the split site—teachers spend much of the day travelling between the two sites—problems of management and issues of discipline, which were thought to be affected by the lack of influence of senior pupils on younger pupils in the school.
The poor accommodation and split site were thought likely to have a detrimental effect on the education of the children who attend Madras college. It is only through the dedication of teaching staff and the hard work of pupils that Madras college manages to maintain the high standards of education that it provides. The message was clear—the existing Madras accommodation was no longer fit for purpose and needed to be replaced urgently. Our kids deserved better.
It is regrettable that inaction from the then Labour-led Fife Council followed that. Only after the 2007 election, when the Liberal Democrats took over Fife Council with the SNP, did progress start to be made on replacing Madras college.
Does the member acknowledge that two more secondary schools and 14 more primaries in Fife have fallen into the C and D categories since 2007? That has all happened under the SNP and Liberal administration.
Let us be honest—schools do not suddenly deteriorate in two years. It is a process, and a lack of investment for several years caused the problem. Madras college has one of the most serious problems, which needs to be addressed urgently. Thanks to the Liberal Democrats being part of the administration in Fife, Madras is a top priority for Fife Council and £40 million has been committed to a new school.
The question of where any new school should be built remains. Two years ago, like Ted Brocklebank I took the view that there was a strong case for considering two new schools—one to serve the Tay bridgehead area and another to serve the St Andrews area. Madras college has been one of the largest schools in Scotland. Its roll has been over 2,000 and it was still 1,722 in 2004. It is not unreasonable to argue that a school of such size is too large and that two schools could be created instead, which would cut travel time for students from the Newport, Wormit and Tayport areas. The roll is split roughly 60:40 between the St Andrews and bridgehead areas. An overall roll of about 1,750 would allow one secondary school with a roll of about 1,050 and another with a roll of about 700. They would be reasonably sized schools to operate.
On that basis, although my top priority in the 2007 election campaign was definitely to have the existing Madras college buildings replaced, I also preferred the two-school option—I make no bones about that. However, it has become clear that school rolls in the area are continuing to decline. Madras's roll was 1,621 in 2008 and is only 1,513 this year. The roll is expected to fall below 1,400 by 2014 and, even if we allow for the expected house building in the local plan of which Ted Brocklebank made much—that is all included in the future roll projections—the roll is not expected ever to rise above 1,500.
That means that the roll of a new Tay bridgehead school would be unlikely ever to reach 600. It is generally accepted that a secondary school of such a size would struggle to provide an adequate range of curriculum options and to sustain a satisfactory fifth and sixth-year cohort. Furthermore, parental choice would be likely to mean that the number in the bridgehead continued to drop as the prospect of a new Madras with a larger curriculum became a greater draw. A new Tay bridgehead school would reduce rather than enhance the educational opportunities for children in the area.
I refuse to play politics with pupils' futures, and I will not continue to support an option that will not provide children in my constituency with the best possible education. Discussion has—rightly—turned to the best site for a new single-site school in St Andrews. I have been in regular contact with Fife Council in the past two years, and I know that the council has worked with parents—including those with children in Tay bridgehead area schools—through the Madras college local development group, which has focused clearly on the location of a new single-site school in St Andrews.
I am pleased to report that Fife Council is working closely with St Andrews University and that the possibility of locating a new Madras school to the west of St Andrews is on the cards. Everyone who is involved is optimistic about a positive outcome because of the shared vision of an opportunity to provide a unique school that works closely with a first-class university. It is hoped that a report to develop the proposal will go to Fife Council's education and children's services committee in the near future.
A new Madras college that was co-located with St Andrews University would provide an exciting new opportunity for the next generation of pupils in the St Andrews and Tay bridgehead areas. We cannot afford to miss that opportunity. I am afraid that Ted Brocklebank and his motion are way off the pace. I hope that he will come up to speed with the rest of us and start to campaign to ensure that we have the best possible school for St Andrews and the Tay bridgehead.
I congratulate my colleague Ted Brocklebank on securing this debate. I cannot claim to be the girl from Madras, despite having played hockey against the school many times when I was at school.
As a former teacher, I am only too aware of the positive impact that a school can have, not only on the education of its pupils but on their families and the wider community. Indeed, in some areas, the school becomes the central focus for the community. In debating the motion, we must think to the future and not the present.
Accessibility is a key component, not only in facilitating travel to and from school but in giving greater opportunities for pupils to take part in after-school activities. In my opinion, the latter is as important to the development and wellbeing of our young people as classroom learning is. It is clear that parents are focusing on the issue.
Like many communities across Scotland, the population of north-east Fife has seen significant growth in recent years. That is set to continue. The school estate statistics for 2009 predict an eventual increase in school rolls in the area as a result of demographic trends. We must be mindful of that in planning ahead. By national standards, Bell Baxter high school is already a large school—last year's roll was 17 pupils over the given capacity. We must also take account of the projected local developments that are set out in the St Andrews and East Fife local plan, particularly those that relate to local employment patterns. The projected long-term changes that will come on line in 10 or 20 years' time must be added to the current level of secondary pupils who reside in north-east Fife. That has convinced Scottish Conservatives that a new secondary school at the Tay bridgehead is essential in addition to the new development for Madras college. When one looks at what other politicians in the local area have said, the only conclusion that one can draw is that there is cross-party consensus on the matter. I say that despite the fact that that consensus has been broken this afternoon.
Building a new school at the Tay bridgehead would not only create that new community facility but would allow pupils to identify more easily with the area from which they come. At present, they are commuters—sometimes over substantial distances—sitting in buses for a considerable length of time on either side of the school day. I do not agree entirely with Claire Baker that that is not the only consideration; it is a significant one. I think that I am correct in saying that it formed part of a debate in the local press and that 67 per cent of parents argued that a new school in the area would be appropriate.
The figure of 67 per cent has been mentioned a few times in the debate. Does the member accept that only about 50 people responded to that online poll?
That is only one example. I understand that there are several other media reports in which local parents were questioned on the subject. Local parents are the main stakeholders in this whole business: they should have the choice and they should determine which school they want their children to attend. The substantial feeling of the vast majority of parents in the area is that some of the distances that their children are being asked to travel are simply not acceptable. On that basis, we have a strong case.
A new secondary school at the Tay bridgehead is very much on the cards. Indeed, there is growing support in the local community for the idea. We must take note of what people are saying in any discussion of a development programme for the local economy. It is not acceptable that Liberal Democrat and SNP councillors are dragging their heels on the matter. Scottish Conservatives will continue to make the case for a new secondary school for the Tay bridgehead area. The basis for doing so, to which Mr Smith alluded, is the best educational interests of children and families in the area.
Elections in the next three years will give voters in north-east Fife the opportunity to ask their elected MP, MSP and councillors where their priorities lie. Do they want to spend just under £1 million each year on bussing children to school or invest in a new secondary school and community centre for the Tay bridgehead that will bring long-term educational, economic and social benefits to the area? This time next year, the choice that they make will be an interesting one.
I congratulate Ted Brocklebank on securing the debate. I welcome the opportunity to highlight the Government's continued commitment to the improvement of the school estate.
Since May 2007, 110,000 pupils have been lifted out of poor condition schools and over 230 schools have been refurbished or built. We have lifted over 13 per cent of Scotland's school estate out of bad or poor condition.
In addition, we have announced a new school-building programme that will involve investing a further £1.25 billion in the school estate the length and breadth of Scotland, delivering around 55 new schools. Auchmuty high school in Fife, which has been mentioned, will be one of the new schools that will be built as part of that programme. We are confident that schools and communities in Fife will benefit from the investment that local and national Government are making in the school estate.
I appreciate that there is a deal of local support for a new school to be built to serve the community of the Tay bridgehead and acknowledge that that is an on-going issue. However, I also acknowledge the points that were made by Iain Smith, who made a persuasive argument for the proposals that Fife Council is pursuing. I make it clear that this is a matter for Fife Council, which is responsible for the provision and maintenance of school buildings in its area and for deciding what priority is to be accorded to work on particular schools. Given that responsibility, ministers must stand back from involvement in discussions on the merits of options for work on individual school buildings and cannot intervene in council business to influence which schools are identified as priorities for replacement or refurbishment or decisions on the establishment of new schools.
On 28 September, the Government, jointly with the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, published its new school estate strategy, "Building Better Schools: Investing in Scotland's Future", which provides a new route map to ensure that all of Scotland's school estate is up to the required standard. Our shared vision, with COSLA, sets out the high value that we place on places of learning that people and communities can enjoy using and be proud of and that enrich the communities that they serve and the lives of learners and their families.
The strategy sets an ambitious joint Government-COSLA target to ensure that no less than 90 per cent of children in Scotland will be educated in good-condition schools—schools in conditions A and B—with firm plans to lift the remaining children into better-condition schools. As Iain Smith indicated, it is absurd to suggest that either the council of the past two years or the Government of that period are responsible for a huge change in the past two and half years in the number of people who are being educated in C-category schools. Ted Brocklebank mentioned that this has been an issue for 50 years. For the majority of that time, the Governments have been either Conservative or Labour, while the council has been run by the Labour Party.
Does the minister accept that, in the eight years prior to 2007, the number of schools in Fife that were in a poor state and condition was starting to move in the right direction and was going down? As I pointed out earlier, since 2007, 16 more schools have fallen into C and D categories.
We cannot but conclude that the fact that schools have fallen into those categories has a lot to do with what happened during the previous eight years and earlier, rather than with what has happened in the past two and a half years. It is absurd to say that it is the result of what has happened during the past two and a half years and has nothing to do with a lack of investment previously.
The strategy that we have set out sets clear aspirations for Scotland's school estate: schools that are fit for purpose in condition, suitability and sufficiency; schools that are well designed, accessible and supportive of our intentions in relation to the curriculum for excellence; schools that strengthen the communities that they serve, enhance people's health and wellbeing and facilitate sustainable economic growth; and a sustainable estate that makes a full contribution to meeting climate change targets. Schools should be efficiently run and should maximise value for money. Having an estate that is both flexible and responsive to future changes in demand is in the interests of us all. Pupils, parents, teachers and communities across Scotland, including Fife, are entitled to a school estate that delivers those aspirations for them. I recognise that it is for Fife Council to determine the shape of the school estate within those parameters.
Liz Smith suggested that the council has been dragging its heels. That does not sit well with the fact that, for the majority of the 50-year period during which the issue has been discussed, according to Ted Brocklebank, we have had Conservative or Labour Governments and a Labour council in Fife. The member suggests that it was a pressing issue, but nothing happened during that time. Two and a half decades of nothing, according to Ted Brocklebank, stand against two and a half years of an SNP-Lib Dem council in Fife that has made substantial progress.
The Government has increased substantially support for capital spending by local authorities across Scotland. This year and last year Fife Council has received £94.3 million for investment in infrastructure, including schools, according to its priorities. We believe that, under the concordat and more generally, local authorities should, where possible, have the power to decide their own affairs. Fife Council should choose its priorities for investment in its school estate, as it does for other areas of its estate and as other councils across Scotland do.
Ministers welcome Fife Council's investment plans for its school estate, with £140 million-worth of investment identified within the council's capital plans. The extent to which investment in a new secondary school at the Tay bridgehead features in Fife's plans for future investment in its school estate is a matter for the council, which will be accountable for its decision. I am happy to respond to the debate in those terms.
Meeting closed at 17:40.