AN OLD Colwyn councillor was told his language was “not appropriate” after he accused a school of being reckless with its spending after the headteacher asked for a council loan.
Ysgol Eirias in Colwyn Bay had requested a bridging loan of £205,205 to enable them to set a balanced budget.
Conwy has slashed school budgets over recent years but can still allocate school loans, but applications of more than £100,000 must be reviewed by a School Loans Panel.
Loans up to £500K must be considered by cabinet, and those over £500K must be debated by council.
The recommendation at the cabinet meeting at Coed Pella on Tuesday was to approve the loan.
But speaking at the meeting, backbench councillor David Carr urged the cabinet to be cautious about lending the money.
“On this particular school, I was the governor at the school for two years, and I’ve got reservations on the financial management,” he said.
“Obviously, Julie (cabinet member for education Cllr Julie Fallon) has not gone into great detail at this meeting, but we need some more detail of the school before we go ahead.
“It’s difficult really as a former governor, but I did at times think they were quite reckless in their spending, and Julie (Cllr Fallon) was saying they actually had systems in place for the last few years to actually (spend less).”
He added: “I don’t think that’s true, and they’ve come to this stage where basically they’ve run out of money. Schools should be properly funded.
“I totally support that. But going ahead with this loan, I think there are implications if the loan can’t be paid back.
“What would happen then? I think we need more information on this school before this decision is made.”
But Cllr Fallon told Cllr Carr his language was “not appropriate”.
“I think we have to be very careful of the language we are using, Cllr Carr,” she said.
“It is not appropriate to use some of the terminology you used there.
“So we have a process in place, a very thorough process. As I said, we have a team that go out. You also have the head of finance.
“They work with the school.
“Then we have the schools loans panel, which I explain to you then that the school came forward with their plan of recovery as part of this, and I’m confident that these people understand, that finance understand, the school understand, what they need to do in terms of that plan going forward, and I am happy and confident to support that today.
“But I think you have to have attended meetings and have a thorough understanding of the approach the school has taken to be able to understand the position, and I would repeat that I would be careful in terms of the language that you are using, Cllr Carr. It is not appropriate.”
She added: “’I’ve worked closely with the school, visited the school, and I’m confident that the headteacher is working incredibly hard to make the changes that she needs to make, and I’m happy to support this today.”
Leader Cllr Charlie McCoubrey then said the situation was difficult as schools and social services accounted for 80% of the authority’s funding. He said there was an increased complexity of need of young people and that the authority was losing funding with declining pupil numbers.
Cllr Nigel Smith said the council had appointed the school loans panel to look at loan applications and that cabinet must listen to their advice. “When they make a recommendation, then really we’ve got to listen to that recommendation,” he said.
“There’s no point in appointing these people if you are not going to listen to what they’ve got to say, so I would hope Cllr Carr would take note of that and rest easy that this is going to be the right decision because it has been looked at, and that’s their recommendation.”
Leader Cllr Charlie McCoubrey seconded Cllr Fallon’s proposal, and the cabinet agreed the loan.
