Monday 9 November 2009

Keep Burdiehouse primary open


Council’s case for closure full of holes
Parents in Burdiehouse feel understandably betrayed by SNP and Liberal Councillors who were elected in May 2007 to oppose cuts in services and who now plan to close 4 city schools.
After 20 years of Labour cuts people voted for change. SNP/Lib Dem councillors were not elected to close Burdiehouse Primary or any other school. Furthermore their case for closure is weak.

WRONG, WRONG and WRONG AGAIN
Marilynne McLaren, the Council’s Education Convenor, claims the city hasn’t got the money to keep Burdiehouse primary open -Wrong.
Edinburgh is the 2nd richest city in Britain. Edinburgh Council is spending £500m on trams. Go get the money Marilynne!
She claims there are not enough children in the area to make the school viable – Wrong.
If she stopped telling people that Burdiehouse was about to close parents would not send their children elsewhere. And with the birth rate growing in Edinburgh school rolls will increase soon Furthermore 25% of youngsters in the city go to private schools. Marilynne McLaren sent her own children to private school! So she is wrong to suggest there is somehow a shortage of kids!

WHICH IS THE ONLY PARTY TO HAVE CAMPAIGNED AGAINST SCHOOL CLOSURES IN EDINBURGH THESE PAST TEN YEARS?
Labour? The Tories? SNP ? Lib Dems? No, no, no and no again!
They all voted for them. Indeed Labour’s record is the worst of all. You might want to remind Nigel Griffiths of that when he hands you his ‘Stop the SNP/Lib Dem cuts’ leaflet. What he is actually saying is ‘How dare they make cuts! That’s Labours job!’

ANSWER, SCOTTISH SOCIALIST PARTY.
We are proud of that fact. The SSP joined with parents at Lismore Primary in Bingham in 2004 for example to defy the closure plans of Ewan Aitken and his Labour Council. And they won a famous victory. We can win another one in Burdiehouse.
We oppose the closure of schools like Burdiehouse because to us they are the heart of local communities. If people here want the school to stay open then that’s good enough, that’s democracy after all.The school belongs to the local community, we pay for it

Our Case for keeping Burdiehouse Primary Open:
It achieves very good educational standards
Smaller class sizes are a good thing for our children’s education
It’s what local people in Burdiehouse want
Edinburgh’s enormous wealth must be shared out much more evenly and fairly. That means investing IN Burdiehouse not taking AWAY vitally important assets like the Primary School.

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