§ 13 and 14. Mr. Kershawasked the Minister of Education (1) what steps he is taking to improve the standard of classrooms at Tetbury Primary School;
641 (2) when he proposes to improve the staff accommodation at Tetbury Primary School.
§ Sir E. BoyleThe proposal for Tetbury is to provide a new building for the juniors as soon as I can include the project in a major school building programme. I can give no date for this at the moment. I understand that at the existing school there is a room for the head teacher and an indoor cloakroom for the women staff, but I have had no proposals from the managers or local education authority to make any other interim improvements. It would be uneconomic to do much building at a school which is due to be replaced, but I am willing to look at any small scheme which may be put to me.
§ Mr. KershawIs my right hon. Friend aware that the parents and even grandparents of children now attending the school are dismayed to find that the classrooms have not been improved since their day? Is it not disheartening to the staff to have to work in these conditions? When will my right hon. Friend be able to give permission for the starting of the work on the site with the plans and with the money they have already collected for the new school?
§ Sir E. BoyleI appreciate the points raised by my hon. Friend. The difficulty is that this proposed new junior school is the last of 14 projects submitted by the Gloucestershire Education Committee for the 1963–65 school building programme. I suggest to my hon. Friend that, as a first step, it might be worth while for the parents and grandparents to try, by such means as are open to them, to express their opinion to the local education authority about the relative priority that the school should have.
§ Mr. KershawThey have done all that.