COULD there be a clearer demonstration of the potential for educational chaos and disruption caused be the now irreversible transition towards academies and free schools than the proposal for Shelley College to admit Year 7 pupils from 2014 (Examiner, September 28)?

While the local authority has to consider the best interests and educational future of all local children, the senior management and governors of Shelley College seem to need to consider only their idea of the best interests of Shelley College.

This is the inevitable outcome of a system where more than 2,000 schools are now accountable solely to the secretary of state.

We now have a situation with many hundreds of local pupils, parents and teachers facing massive stress and uncertainty with key questions about their future in the balance.

This is wider than the viability of the middle schools and the lack of a Year 6 at any of the first schools, but goes to the heart of effective educational provision by a local authority in an environment where central government seems convinced that competition, structure and governance are of more importance than effective teaching, stability and local accountability.

Lewis Rich

Fixby

No to ‘supersize’ school

I HAD never experienced a middle school system before moving into this area.

I realise I missed out as a child! The whole reason we moved into the area is because of the school system and the excellent education and family values it delivers.

I do not want my children to be swallowed up in some ‘supersize’ school where they feel like they don’t matter until they reach Year 10.

Show me another school of some 2,000 pupils where that isn’t the case!

This is about one man’s ambition and the money it will provide to Shelley, not children’s welfare in the slightest.

Simon Pocock

Skelmanthorpe

If it’s not broken ...

I FEEL it would be too daunting for little ones used to being at a school of 300 children to go to a school of nearly 2,000 children.

I know how frightening it was for me going into a bigger school, but 2,000 pupils is ridiculous.

It’s always worked well. I think things are changing too much and too fast. If something works, why interfere with it?

Valerie Doherty

Scissett

UK needs proper jobs

I SUSPECT John Kaye (Mailbag, September 5) is having a bit of fun when he says in his final sentence ‘vote for me, John Kaye, your future local Labour MP’.

However, in the unlikely event that he is being serious then I am saddened that a Labour supporter should come out with such policies.

Mr Kaye advocates getting the unemployed of all ages to do what he calls worthwhile and necessary jobs and only paying them what they would receive on social security benefits.

I strongly disagree and, indeed, consider it to be more in tune with right-wing Conservative Party thinking on this issue.

I suggest that if there are jobs to be done – and there clearly are – then for goodness sake let the unemployed actually be employed to do those jobs and be paid a decent rate of pay for doing them.

The unemployed should not be treated as though they are criminals sentenced to do some form of community punishment.

Many of the jobs we have already are as a result of the consumerism that keeps the whole show on the road.

However, when the money runs out, as it has for many people, we then find ourselves unable to carry on spending and the country is subsequently in trouble.

At the moment almost all consumer goods are made somewhere other than our own country. We only have to look at the labels in our clothes, or look at where our radios, televisions or cars are made to verify this.

Yes, there are British made goods but nowhere near enough to boost the economy and create jobs.

When a factory is built that makes goods it doesn’t just provide employment for those actually working in the factory, it also creates a host of other businesses and jobs, whether that be supplying and delivering parts or service industry jobs providing food for the workers, more pubs near the factory and so on.

The best way to get people back into work is for a future government to have the political will to shift the emphasis away from Britain relying too heavily on the financial services industry and, in particular, the City of London for her prosperity and instead return to an economy based largely on manufacturing.

Robert Nicholls

Kirkburton

Not meeting the manager

I’M addressing this to Network Rail through the Examiner’s Mailbag.

I read your press release on the Huddersfield line closure with interest (http://www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk/Press-Releases/COUNTDOWN-TO-SHUT-DOWN-1b7d.aspx).

The line will be closed in October/November to allow for a station upgrade at Stalybridge.

You reassure passengers that “train operators First TransPennine Express and Northern Rail have hosted a series of Meet the Manager events at stations affected by the work.’’

However, I live at Marsden and there have been no ‘Meet the Manager’ events.

I understand from other friends and colleagues that they haven’t been held at Slaithwaite station either. So that’s at least two of the affected stations missed.

Major changes are planned to this trans-Pennine line over the next few years and train services to our local stations are under threat so I do hope this isn’t a signal that you plan to forget us altogether.

Fiona Weir

Colne Valley

Houses on Castle Hill

THE prospect of a hotel on Castle Hill is a pure mercantile enterprise.

Kirklees Council should also consider selling advertising space up there or allow house building – very prominent – as there are those who would pay a lot of money and it would go a long way to help bridge the budget deficit.

A B Jenkinson

Milnsbridge

No public money

FURTHER to the letter from ‘Leymoor Lad, Cowlersley’ on 27/9/12 I would like to correct a misunderstanding which I noticed in a letter to the Examiner last week.

I am pleased to confirm that not a single penny of public money is being spent on the rebranding of the stadium and surrounding roads. This project is being entirely paid for by Heineken, who own John Smith’s, as part of the new stadium naming sponsorship deal.

Gareth Davies

Managing Director, Kirklees Stadium Development Ltd

Fight road tolls

IN 2007 the government backed down after 1.8 million people signed a petition against road pricing.

Wary of that, the newly-elected Coalition government promised not to bring in road pricing (other than for lorries) or even prepare for it.

Although the government would consider levying tolls on totally new major roads like motorways, we were assured that our existing roads would not be tolled.

There is now the threat of major routes in England effectively being sold off and the public being charged to use existing roads.

The government has quietly started engaging with local authorities with a view to softening up public opinion.

The driving public has paid something like £500 billion into the roads since 1997 with only a fraction spent back. To charge us even more for driving on inadequate roads would be adding insult to injury.

There is actually money for improving our roads, only it is spent on the wrong things – like HS2 and financing roads in other developed countries.

The government should get its priorities right instead of reaching into our pockets. I encourage readers to write to their MP c/o House of Commons, London SW1A 0AA to say ‘Can’t pay, won’t pay.’’

Brian Gregory

Chairman, Association of British Drivers