As St George's School staff, pupils and parents celebrate their hard fought victory over Salford Council's determined efforts to shut their school, the city's schools programme has been thrown into chaos, with only Phase 1 of BSF (Walkden High and Irlam & Cadishead rebuilds) definitely going ahead.
Nick Page, Deputy Director of Children's Services, has written to all Head Teachers in Salford saying "it is recognised that there will now be a delay in the completion of the programme as a whole", and has called an emergency meeting of all Catholic heads in the city tomorrow morning.
With Jill Baker, Director of Children's Services and architect of the Building Schools for the Future, suspended awaiting a disciplinary hearing at the end of the month, and the news that Stephen Bradbury, head of the BSF programme, will be leaving Salford Council also at the end of the month, it appears that the Council's Children's Service department is in meltdown.
However, the Council is adamant that Stephen Bradbury's retirement and St George's victory and Jill Baker's forthcoming case are not linked.
Alan Westwood, Salford City Council's strategic director of customer and support services, says "Stephen Bradbury will formally leave the authority at the end of the month following his retirement.
"It is not appropriate for me to discuss the personal arrangements of individual members of staff but I can confirm that Stephen's retirement has been planned for some months, in line with a typical notice period, and his decision took account of a key milestone in the BSF programme - financial closure of Phase I. Following financial closure, we are now poised for the next phase of the BSF programme and plans are in hand to ensure we are best prepared for this next step.
"I would like to thank Stephen for his contribution to the BSF programme over the past three years and he will leave the authority with our best wishes."
We're sure that Salford residents will make up their own minds on this...
…
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
(3).jpeg)
.png)
(1).JPG)
