'Perfect site' for new high school is up for sale

Councillors say land being sold by Worcestershire County Council could provide a location for a new secondary school.

The 18-acre plot on the edge of Worcester is up for sale as part of plans to build 1,000 new homes, a railway station, a primary school and shops in Rushwick.

Councillors say the land would be a good location for a school after the authority stopped working on a separate project off Newtown Road.

But Dan Boatright-Greene, Liberal Democrat cabinet member for education, said building a new school would involve borrowing and grant funding that could "risk jeopardising" the rest of the county.

Richard Udall, a Labour county and city councillor, said the plot off the A4440 in Rushwick was "perfect for a site for a new school".

"The council should keep the land and start the process to build a new secondary school to accommodate the extra growth in population caused by the western expansion of Worcester," he said.

"At the very least, it should only be sold to a developer, linked to the existing and proposed developments, with a condition that they build a new high school."

He added: "Worcestershire County Council has over £33m allocated within its capital programme for a new school for the city. By using land we already own we could save money and ensure a school is located at this site."

Labour's Dines Green and Grove Farm councillor Matt Lamb said the council needed to plan for the children who would live in the proposed new housing in Rushwick.

"We should think long-term and ensure children in St John's and surrounding communities have access to excellent local education rather than selling the land and potentially having to find another site at a greater cost," he said.

Existing plans for a secondary school off Newtown Road are in limbo after the estimated cost of the project rose to £63 million and the council's previous Reform UK administration said it couldn't afford to build it.

However, attempts to completely remove the Newtown Road school from the council's capital programme were defeated by the then opposition to the minority administration.

Now a member of the coalition which wrested power from Reform in May, Boatright-Greene said sufficient secondary school places for Worcester City secondary pupils between 2029 and 2023 would be provided through the expansion of existing schools.

"The government is not providing sufficient funding and developers are not legally forced to cover the costs of building the schools we need," he said.

He said the borrowing required, in the absence of government grants, "risks jeopardising the affordability of the whole education capital programme for all of Worcestershire."

This news was gathered by the Local Democracy Reporting Service which covers councils and other public service organisations.

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