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Decision time on Swansea Valley Schools reorganisation plan
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12 April 2023
A decision on plans to replace three Swansea Valley primary schools with a new English medium school in Pontardawe will be made by members of Neath Port Talbot Council’s Cabinet on April 19th, 2023.
The council’s former Cabinet approved the proposed replacement of primary schools at Alltwen, Llangiwg and Godre’rgraig with the new school plus a specialist learning centre and public swimming pool in October 2021.
But after the May 2022 local elections, the council’s new Rainbow Coalition administration pledged to review the new school proposal, this being followed by a successful legal challenge to the plans by parent group RhAG in relation to a Welsh Language Impact Assessment.
As a result, a new proposal with a fresh round of stakeholder consultation has taken place. The consultation took place between the 5th December 2022 and the 7th February 2023. It included holding a public meeting in Pontardawe and online, and meetings with various stakeholders including school governors, staff and parents. The consultation period was also extended for two weeks to allow for additional comments.
Now that the consultation has been completed, the Joint meeting of the Cabinet and Education, Skills and Wellbeing Scrutiny Committee will have the opportunity to consider the consultation report and offer views to the Cabinet before it decides its course of action. This meeting will take place at 2pm on the 19th April, prior to the meeting of Cabinet.
Cabinet will make the decision on whether to progress the proposal to its next stage (this will involve approving the publication of a proposal to go ahead with the new school allowing 28 days for objections with a final decision in June/July 2023) or to abandon the proposal.
The Cabinet report and associated documents can be viewed here: https://democracy.npt.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=158&MId=11289
Following the submission of a detailed business case, the Welsh Government’s 21st Century Schools Programme (now Sustainable Communities for Learning) approved 65% capital grant funding for the new school scheme (originally costed at £22m) with the remainder coming from prudential borrowing by the council.
The consultation report summarising the responses received and the officer responses to them can be viewed here (as of Tuesday 4th April): https://www.npt.gov.uk/1890
Residents can attend the meeting in person at the Council Chamber in Port Talbot Civic Centre.
Residents can also view it live via Microsoft Teams. Residents will need to pre-register to be part of the virtual public gallery by emailing democratic.services@npt.gov.uk by 12 noon the day before the meeting. Details of how to join will be provided in the response.
A recording of the meeting will be available on the council’s website shortly after the meeting.