The school’s headteacher said families felt ‘deeply let down’ by the decision
A South London council has thrown out a request to delay closure of a much-loved residential school in Kent for autistic children. Bradstow School will close on December 31, after Labour-run Wandsworth Council agreed it was not financially viable to keep it open any longer.
Conservative councillors had called in the cabinet’s decision to shut the school, which was taken on November 3, arguing it might have broken rules on transparency and reasonability. They hoped to delay the decision to give the school more time to explore options to stay open.
But the council’s general overview and scrutiny committee rejected the request after a debate on November 17. The move means the closure will come into effect on December 31.
Labour councillor Sheila Boswell said: “I know this decision will be viewed as unpopular and I know it’s a huge disappointment to the staff and families of the Bradstow School community, but there are two things of which we must be very clear and upon which the closure decision was based.
“Firstly, that the proposal to close is not a reflection of the quality of care and education that is provided by Bradstow School staff. The other, which is the most important part, is that the school’s financial position is in such a place it means that the school is unsustainable.”
Wandsworth inherited the school in 1990, after the Inner London Education Authority (ILEA) was abolished. While many local authorities have used the school over the years, most of the students have typically been from Kent. It provides accommodation during term time for autistic children with complex needs aged between five and 19 years old.
A report by council officers said Wandsworth had been working with Kent County Council to explore transferring the provision since November 2021, but Kent decided not to proceed with this option last October. The council said it was left with no other choice but to propose closure due to the school’s financial challenges, with other councils unwilling to pay the fees needed to ensure it remained viable.
The school has an overall deficit of nearly £1million and holds debt with other councils of £5.3m, according to the report, including £4.6m with Kent.
The council delayed the closure process by six months this year to allow governors more time to secure its future by turning it into an academy. The Department for Education (DfE) advised it could not approve an application by Cygnus Academy Trust in July, however, and did not tell the council if it would approve another application by Bridge Academy Trust before the decision was made on November 3.
Sarah Adams, Bradstow’s headteacher, said the school had shown it was viable but its efforts had been blocked, including by preventing new admissions, as she called for the council to allow more time to make an informed decision about academisation.
The school now has 11 pupils, including one from Wandsworth.
Ms Adams said: “The impact goes far beyond one school and will be felt for years. Families feel deeply let down. Many have spent years fighting for the right support, only now to face long journeys, unfamiliar settings and the fear of their children being uprooted from the adults who know them best.”
Conservative councillor Aled Richards-Jones argued there was a lack of openness and transparency in the cabinet’s decision as full correspondence with the DfE had not been published ahead of the meeting on November 3. He said there was a risk the decision was unreasonable or irrational as the DfE had not endorsed closure of the school, but simply withdrawn its request to pause the process, before a decision was made.
But Labour councillor Judi Gasser said officers had repeatedly asked for reassurance from the DfE about the possibility of turning the school into an academy, which it had not given. She said she inferred the DfE would not grant Bridge Academy Trust’s application from its correspondence, which it confirmed soon after the decision to close Bradstow had been made.
“We have allowed plenty of time to explore these academy options and, unfortunately, they’ve come to nothing so far. I don’t see an alternative,” Councillor Gasser said. “I’ve run out of options. We’ve come to the end of the road.”
The cabinet agreed to take no further action on the call-in request at the end of the meeting, with three councillors voting in favour and two against, meaning the school will shut on December 31.
The council has started legal proceedings to recover fees from Kent.
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