Although Powys are inching towards a solution it is all painfully slow. I therefore another letter to the Council Leader was required - see below. Dear Cllr Thomas Thank you for your email of 13 October. I realise you find my letters and emails irritating and would prefer not to have to deal with them but as I found when I was a CEO of a major charity by paying attention to correspondence like this I learnt that I did not always have the full story and from such communications I discovered that my senior staff sometimes were trying to cover up mistakes they would rather I did not know about or were giving me information they thought I wanted to hear rather than the real issues. Judging by the way your officers are drafting responses to my emails for you this is I think what is happening to you. Therefore I am going to have one more go at trying to help you understand. 1. Whilst your officers want to suggest you are aware that your authority has not “complied fully with the School Transformation Policy 2014”, the real problem is that back in March when the Cabinet took a decision to close Gwernyfed to facilitate the rebuilding of Brecon HS that policy was not being invoked. The suggestion that it was, only arose after the judicial review papers arrived 23/24 June when it was obvious to your senior legal officer that your authority was facing a law suit it could not win and even then the “Transformation Policy” was not invoked. 2. For the schools involved the idea that the Transformation Policy was being invoked only became clear at the meetings on the 21 September when it was said your representatives were starting again, but at stage 2. In other words there is no evidence that stage 1 had ever been implemented. Forgive me councillor but it’s not so much that you are not fully compliant with the “Transformation Policy”, as not compliant at all! 3. The central problem is this. Your officers are labouring under the illusion that the Statutory Schools Organisation Code does not “kick in” until after discussions are completed under your “Transformation Policy” when it fact it commences from the beginning of the implementation of your policy process. The Schools Organisation Statutory Code on page 7 paragraph 1.3 states: The following paragraphs set out the factors which should be taken into account by relevant bodies when exercising their functions of preparing (my bold type) and publishing school organisation proposals or approving/determining them... It does not say "after proposals or plans have been agreed......" In other words the code should be applied throughout the process of reviewing a school under the Powys CC Transformation Policy NOT afterwards. 4. Nowhere in your authority’s policy does it say how or when it will comply with the Statutory Schools Organisation Code which is a statutory requirement. It basically means that from the original decision making to the present time the authority has completely failed to comply with any statutory obligations or its own policy. Simply saying you are operating under a policy or statute does not make it so you actually have to do so. On a different but parallel note, the Care & Social Services Inspectorate report into Powys home care found the change to a commissioning model of services as “flawed in concept, design and delivery”. The same could be said of the “Schools Transformation Policy” and its implementation. 5. An example of the confusion that exists within the authority is your reference to a comment of mine in relation to a “community impact statement” (not an “equality impact” that you refer to) as being about the former proposal for the closure of Gwernyfed HS etc. Not true. On the 18 September I received a very angry ‘phone call from one of your senior officers complaining that I was being “fatuous” in suggesting that the drafting of an impact statement required the authority to have contact with the parents, students and community groups effected by any future proposals. That individual was talking about future proposals not those in the past. 6. However, it is mindboggling to suggest that preparing such a statement does not require contact with the people effected given such a failure would be a serious breach of the Schools Statutory Code. If the individual’s state of high dudgeon was an attempt to bully me into being quiet it was ineffective, in any case I have had bullying attempts made by more significant people against me that failed. Margaret Thatcher for example once tried to sack me as chair of an arms-length government committee and had to withdraw with a metaphorical bloody nose, so your staff need to back off and stop being foolish. Equally they have to stop coming up with foolish proposals such as telling schools they have 14 days to respond to a vague and ambiguous set of proposals as schools were told on the 21 September. Neither the Statutory Code nor your Transformation Policy process carry any such timescales. How do we get out of this mess? 1. To begin with the authority needs to start listening and stop trying to defend the indefensible, all that does is lay itself open to a series of future judicial reviews, complaints and referrals to the Local Government Ombudsman, not to mention the Auditor General for Wales, all of which are avoidable. 2. The Authority needs to suspend its “Schools Transformation Policy” until it has been completely rewritten to ensure full compliance with the Statutory Schools Organisation Code. This needs to be done by someone outside of the authority who understands what is required. 3. Take the Gwernyfed closure plan off the table and concentrate on the alternative plans that are available. I understand the “Through School” concept is at last being taken seriously and although officers are not apparently visiting the best examples in Wales, in Ceredigion. I realise this may be politically difficult for your chief executive who rejected the idea when it was put forward by the CEO of Ceredigion and therefore he will have to swallow his pride which frankly is irrelevant given that if the concept is applied to Powys it could solve a lot of your problems including the ongoing difficulties in Brecon, negate the need once and for all for closure of Gwernyfed and get you out of a deep hole that is now opening up in the North of the County. 4. It would also allow the authority to benefit from the award of a Welsh Government and Arts Council Wales grant to Gwernyfed HS (and Crickhowell and a few primary schools) to be at the forefront of a new policy to use the arts to expand creativity for young people across the curriculum thus becoming an exemplar school. (I am assuming your senior officers have told you about this). Taken together all of this would allow the authority to move faster on sorting out Brecon HS by developing plans for a smaller, better school at a reduced cost, focusing attention on education instead of grand plans. Let me make one final suggestion. You could try engaging with me instead of batting me away, by meeting with me. Include some key officers, it might prove helpful and who knows we might even find some common ground. Are you open to showing that kind of positive political leadership? Best wishes Cofion Gorau JOHN FITZGERALD