Garth School Saved - but no way to run a council

Congratulations to the Garth School Action Group on winning their campaign to save the Spalding Special School from closure.

But from start to finish, over the summer and into the autumn, this sorry episode has been appallingly handled by Lincolnshire County Council.

We had:

* The farce of an official confirming the school was under threat of closure, then Ececutive Member for Childrens Services Trisha Bradwell denying the school was under threat and wrongly blaming the Spalding Guardian for "whipping up a headline to frighten the parents".

* The chaos of Trisha Bradwell agreeing to meet the parents to tell them what was going on but then refusing to meet them at the last minute.

* Now we have more unneccesary grief caused by the way Trisha Bradwell chose to announce what should have been good news.

On Monday of this week, without any apparent consultation, she arrogantly put out a press release announcing that Garth would federate with another school in Spalding.

According to the Garth Action Group's site Trisha had not even had the courtesy to inform the Garth School Governors.

They were apparently blissfully unaware until they were contacted by the media.

It's no way to run a council and no way to restore public confidence following the damage of the Speechley-Croft era.