ON the subject of council tax rises, council leader Rod Hills is quoted as saying we will just have to make the best of it (Evening Press, November 10). Just such a cavalier attitude was also shown in a recent meeting at Queen Anne School.

The proposal at that meeting was to shut Queen Anne School, borrow £2.5 million and use it to build certain facilities, such as a drama hall, sports hall etc at Canon Lee School.

Canon Lee School is just three-quarters of a mile from Queen Anne - and Queen Anne already has all of the facilities mentioned! When asked where the money was to come from to pay back the loan, Rod Hills answered 'Revenues'. In other words, our pockets.

Of course, not only financial pain is caused by the proposal. Queen Anne pupils face being dispersed to schools all over the city, by a council which claims to put children first!

Children will be in a new school, without friends, knowing not one teacher, just in time to start GCSE courses. Children with special needs will be torn from their supportive network into a totally new environment.

The very real emotional distress caused by this proposal for children, parents and teachers is not even recognised by educational services; they simply sent the children home with a letter telling them their school was to shut.

What may concern most parents, if you have school-age children, is Michael Peters (director of educational services) sees closing Queen Anne School as only 'a partial solution'. Other schools will have to shut too. If these proposals are allowed to proceed, your child's school may be the next to close.

Join the parents of the children at Queen Anne and Canon Lee Schools in protesting at these expensive, inhumane measures.

Jane McKie,

Bootham Terrace,

York.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.