Hammersmith and Fulham Council says it is doing everything possible to support the parents of the 55 H&F boys who had been expecting to begin studying at Fulham Boys School in September.

The council says it was a "shock" to receive this letter on July 2 from the Department of Education stating that:

" Unfortunately we have not been able to secure permanent accommodation for the Fulham Boys School. Lord Nash and the Secretary of State have discussed the issue and ministers have taken the decision to defer the opening of the school to 2015 at the earliest."

It says Fulham Boys School were apparently formally told of the decision on July 1, one day before the council received the letter.

The council adds that free schools are free of local council control and the Fulham Boys School therefore came under the direct auspices of the Rt Hon Michael Gove MP, the government’s secretary of state for education. It is and has been Mr Gove’s responsibility, via the Education Funding Agency, to ensure that the school can be housed and funded.

The school currently has a lease arrangement with CapCo, the owners of an empty school building in Gibbs Green, West Kensington. This lease arrangement would give the school two years to find a permanent home.

With that in mind, the government had given the free school permission earlier this year to recruit staff and pupils to open this September.

Councillor Sue Macmillan, Cabinet Member for Children and Education says: "We thoroughly disagree with this decision and will do all we can to work with the parents and boys affected.

" Free schools are free of local council responsibility but despite that I have written to the government to seek an urgent explanation for its change of heart, what efforts have been made to secure a permanent site and why they reached this decision so late in the day.

" This administration believes that free schools have an important role to play in improving the quality of local places on offer to local families and it is devastating that the opening of Fulham Boys School has been halted less than nine weeks before it was meant to open."

 

July 3, 2014