Neath Port Talbot super-school: Parents still oppose plan

Renewed plans to replace three English-medium primary schools with a super-school continue to face opposition.

The plans for the new primary school in Pontardawe were approved last year by Neath Port Talbot council.

But the High Court ruled the plans were "unlawful" for failing to assess their impact on local Welsh language schools.

The council has presented a new consultation, again asking to shut the Alltwen, Godre'r Graig and Llangiwg primary schools.

A new school next to Cwmtawe Community School would have a swimming pool and a specialist learning support centre.

But some parents said closing the local schools would have a detrimental effect on their children's education.

"It will be terrible for us," said Rachel Jones, mum to three children at Alltwen primary. "The boys walk to school every day. The new school will be just too far for us."

In a statement, the council said it encouraged all stakeholders in the school and the community to respond and give their opinion.

Ms Jones claimed the plans do not "make sense".

"The location is also a problem," she said. "It is already very busy in the morning in Pontardawe without thinking of the traffic the new school could cause.

"The school will also be next door to the comprehensive school which causes concern," she said. "We hear examples of young children going back home using terrible language after what they have heard there.

"There is so much potential in the three schools ," she added. "In Alltwen for example there is enough space to make the school bigger, so there is no excuse why the money could not be spent on improving the three schools.

"At the end of the day the children are babies. They don't want to be in a school with 700 other children."

Another parent, Emily Marie, said her son had "finally settled in" at Alltwen after previously attending three different schools.

"It has helped with his confidence and he loves it here," she said. "I believe that if the new school is built he will just be lost in the system.

"There will be no sense of community in the new school. I fear my son will isolate himself as he did in the other larger schools he had attended before Alltwen.

"The schools need to be updated, I understand that, but I don't think this is the answer."

The organisation Parents for Welsh Medium Education (RHAG) secured a judicial review against the plan last year.

"It was inevitable that the consultation would come back," said Elin Maher, national director of RHAG, "but we are disappointed that it's come back more or less in the same way as how it was presented in the first place."

"A rethink is needed," she added. "They need to consider the impact, and take into account what their own study tells them."

In October last year, the Welsh government commissioned a report looking at what impact a new super-school would have on the Welsh language.

It found no action would be sufficient to mitigate the damage to Welsh.

Sioned Williams, MS for South Wales West, said: "I don't think the Welsh government should ever have given approval to these outlined plans in the first place, and therefore they should have never have gone to consultation.

"They are damaging to the Welsh language, the government's own report has shown that."

"The plans aren't suitable for the three communities that they're going to be affecting," she added. "I would urge the council to listen to the communities and bring forward more suitable plans."

The council is proposing to build the new school for 770 pupils between the ages of three and 11 on the playing fields of Parc Ynysderw at a cost of more than £22m.

Dai Brain, a councillor on Pontardawe Town Council, said it would have a detrimental effect on grassroots sport.

"The community stands to lose 30% of our playing fields, which is the size of two football playing fields," he said. "To make the loss worse, it's the areas of the field that are very suitable to play on which will be lost.

"The popularity of playing a sport is increasing rapidly, especially for women and girls, so we have to defend land like this because once it's gone, it's gone."

The public consultation is open until 24 January.

A spokesperson for Neath Port Talbot council said: "The council's coalition administration gave a commitment to review the original proposal and the authority is encouraging all school stakeholders and the community to respond to the consultation and give their views."

A Welsh government spokesperson said: "Funding for the school was approved in principle following the submission of a business case, which is subject to conditions which will need to be satisfied."