by former Labour ILEA councillor John O'Malley

Traditionally, parents in this part of Lambeth tended to look for secondary school places down the Northern line. Under ILEA, that is up to 1990, it didn't matter in which Borough your children received their education. In 1989-90 large numbers of Lambeth children went to Graveney, Ernest Bevin, Chestnut Grove and Battersea Park in Wandsworth, Kingsdale in Southwark and Pimlico in Westminster. Chestnut Grove and Kingsdale had near 60% Lambeth intake and Pimlico had 40% from Lambeth and 20% from Southwark.

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s school rolls fell significantly and there was government pressure to reduce numbers by closing schools. The main pressure was put on the education authorities to remove places. Church schools, although frequently in inferior premises, could not be forced to close and closures all fell on the LEA maintained schools. No church secondary school closed. The ILEA closed Tulse Hill School and Lambeth closed Dick Sheppard Schools between 1989 and 1992. A proposal to move Charles Edward Brook from its split site to the Dick Sheppard site failed for some reason. There can be little doubt that from 1979 to 1997 central government, Tory controlled, gave very little assistance to the development of education in Labour held areas.

A significant factor was also the preferential treatment given by central government to Wandsworth Council. Wandsworth Council was a key Conservative Borough and was used to try out many ideas that passed into national policy much of which has now been accepted by the current government. From a Lambeth perspective it is clear that, whilst nothing was done to encourage Lambeth to develop a coherent secondary sector or even to co-operate with the adjoining LEAs to develop the system, Wandsworth was encouraged to open new schools. As far as we can tell ADT was given the old Mayfield school site for a peppercorn rent, The John Archer site was improved by the addition of a council funded service road and then sold off for a large sum. A third site, that of the former Wandsworth Boys' School, allegedly riddled with asbestos, is still in cold storage but earmarked for a new Church of England music specialist school. Wandsworth Council has actively sought to create provision to "get back" children who were going into Merton, Kingston and Hammersmith from the west and to use Lambeth Children from the east to fill take up places in the schools along the Lambeth border.

Wandsworth was also awash with capital monies derived from site disposal and house sales. Millions were put into Chestnut Grove and Ernest Bevin Schools. Over the same period Lambeth had very little money to invest in its secondary schools. Receipts from the Tulse Hill and Dick Sheppard sites do not appear to have been used for investment in the Lambeth secondary sector.

When the ILEA was abolished it was in the middle of extensive reorganisation of the 16-19 offer. It was acknowledged that many so called sixth forms were failing those who elected to go to them. Sixth form provision was not comprehensive by any means with A Level students being given the lion's share of resources and very little attention being given to those other children with an education entitilement up to the age of 19. Experimental initiatives had shown that sixth form colleges and FE colleges with strong 16-19 courses were far more popular with students that the traditional school sixth form. The move towards smaller secondary schools had led to many schools having small and not very efficient sixth forms. It was recognised that schools could not make a full sixth form offer unless they could attract at least 150 students in both year 12 and 13 - an impossible expectation for schools with only 5 or 6 forms of entry. Both the ILEA and the CE and RC authorities were moving towards a system with sixth form colleges replacing the flakey sixth form provision.

Abolition of the ILEA came before the LEA schools had agreed a 16-19 strategy. The Catholic Schools had gone through reorganisation with St Francis Xavier providing the whole Catholic 6th form offer for Wandsworth, Lambeth and Southwark. With abolition Lambeth and Southwark kept to the educationally more sound 6th Form college approach - but without the funds to carry it through - whilst Wandsworth decreed that all its secondary schools would have 6th forms.

Foundation schools and Voluntary aided schools in Lambeth have agitated to restore their 6th forms and La Retraite and Dunraven have succeeded in this. There must be some doubt about how far this is benefitting children over the full ability range and many schools are now erecting additional tests to "get into" their sixth forms for those young people fully entitled to get education until they reach the age of 19.

There have been a number of attempts to establish a mixed comprehensive school on the site of the former Henry Thornton School. The old Henry Thornton Boys' School was not popular in the neighbourhood 25 years ago and numbers fell. Initiative by some of the governors, local employers and active members of staff together with elements in the local community foundered through the indifference and hostility of the, then headteacher who would not entertain the changes then popular in the area.

A second initiative came with the proposal to amalgamate the failing Henry Thornton with the mixed Hydeburn School in Balham. Although the Hydeburn School was modern, built in 1975, the Henry Thornton site was better with more space and better facilities. It was also clear that there was a greater need for Lambeth secondary school places than in Wandsworth. After a major campaign in 1986 the decision was taken to amalgamate the two schools on the Balham site. This new school, Chestnut Grove, is now 16 years old and has more that 50% of its intake from the immediate Balham/Clapham neighbourhoods.

Two factors figured in this decision. First a number of prominent ILEA members, particularly with a Wandsworth interest, saw the Henry Thornton Site as ideal for a sixth form college experiment and were not prepared to release the site to respond to a popular local campaign. A second factor which made it easy for the politicians and officers to discount the local pressures was the complete failure of the campaign to reflect all the interests of the local community in the struggle. The campaign was seen as elitist and oblivious to the concerns of all sections of the community.

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