Action plan submitted to North Yorkshire Council in bid to save Harrogate village primary school from closure

Skelton cum Newby Parish Council has submitted an action plan, developed by a group including several headteachers, to restore classes at Skelton Newby Hall Primary School, between Boroughbridge and Ripon, in response to the North Yorkshire Council’s consultation on the closure of the school.

While the parish council is just the latest of numerous groups attempting to halt the closure of a rural primary school in the county, it is understood to be the first to argue there is a lack of primary school capacity in the surrounding area.

The council has rejected numerous accusations in recent years over “distant decision-making”, particularly in regard to the closure of small, rural schools, which its leadership underlined last month was completely contrary to its ambitions.

Nevertheless, in a report to North Yorkshire Council’s executive last month, officers said the school’s governing body had “been active in their collective efforts to raise numbers at the school through many initiatives over recent years”, but pupil numbers had fallen to one.

The report stated although Skelton had been designated a service village in the Harrogate District Local Plan, there was no new housing planned in the Skelton Newby Hall’s catchment area.

Officers said across the local area a potential 188 additional pupils were expected to join across the five nearby schools until 2027/28 and there was potential to provide additional capacity at Boroughbridge Community Primary School.

Although the parish council said it had been left in the dark until proposals to close the school were under way, officers said the move had been “unanimously” instigated locally, by the school’s governors, and was supported by the falling roll and the need to provide quality and breadth of education.

The officers’ report stated the council also believes there is sufficient capacity in the area to meet both the current and future primary school capacity requirements.

However, in its response to the closure consultation, the parish council has highlighted statutory guidance issued by the Department of Education in January that all decision-makers were expected “to adopt a presumption against the closure of rural schools”.

The Department of Education spokesman added: “This does not mean that a rural school will never close, but that the case for closure should be strong and clearly in the best interests of educational provision in the area.”

In its response to the consultation, the parish council said the community does not believe that the proposal to close the school had met the Department of Education threshold for closure, claiming there is not sufficient pupil capacity in the area and as a standalone school it could be strong and viable.

The parish council document states: “We have identified there is already a shortage of capacity in the area with more demand to be met from the new housing developments which are still being built, as well as further developments with planning.”

The parish council said while the authority had pointed towards capacity at Boroughbridge Community Primary School the “reality is quite different” with that school being close to its 230 capacity.

The parish document added: “We are confident that with the committed support from the local community and the new North Yorkshire Council, this school, with its ambition and leadership restored, can once again provide a valuable contribution to the education provision in the area.

“We can only achieve this by working in partnership with North Yorkshire Council.

"The new unitary council has a clear stated aim – local at its heart.

"We will work closely with town and parish councils to ensure that local priorities drive locally led decision-making and local action.”