Education faces 'total disarray' without funding, warns P&R member Murray

Speaking to the latest Guernsey Press politics podcast, Bob Murray warned that starving the new education model of capital funding later this month would create chaos for sixth form students in particular.

He said it would either leave them in inadequate facilities at La Mare de Carteret indefinitely or require an expansion to accommodate more than 1,000 students at Les Varendes.

‘What you’ve got to think is, are we going to throw education into total disarray again?’ he said.

‘We’ve had this for over 10 years. The teachers have had enough. We’re losing teachers hand over fist.

‘They have had enough, and quite rightly so if the States wants to be so irresponsible that it wants to stop something that is in mid-flow.’

• Listen to Matt Fallaize's full interview with Deputy Bob Murray on the Guernsey Press Politics Podcast

Two years ago the States backed Education, Sport & Culture to reorganise education into three 11-16 schools and build separate sixth form and further education centres at Les Ozouets.

The scheme is among a lengthy list of capital projects for which the Policy & Resources Committee wants deputies to agree to borrow an additional £350m. as part of its latest bid to get GST and other tax changes through the States.

Deputy Murray, a former vice-president of ESC and now a member of P&R, said rejecting funding would create a vacuum and that students would suffer.

If that happened, he said he would prefer to see the sixth form at La Mare de Carteret for an extended period rather than retained at Les Varendes alongside a larger 11-16 school.

‘I would move the sixth form because it’s going to be about £140,000 to bring the sixth form at La Mare up to the kind of level that it would require.

‘It’s not going to be a long-term solution. It cannot be. But we cannot accommodate those 1,200 students on that one site [Les Varendes],’ said Deputy Murray.

He estimated that it would cost about £9m. to extend Les Varendes and a further £5m. to move third sector organisations which could otherwise be accommodated there.

Deputy Murray rejected claims from some other politicians that P&R should stand down if it fails for a third time to secure a majority in the States for its long-term tax and spending plan.

‘You can walk away, which would be very, very irresponsible,’ he said.

‘I mean, we’re talking about a tax package. There is a huge amount of other things that P&R deals with on a day-to-day basis that we are familiar with [and] anybody coming back into the situation would have to familiarise themselves with.

‘I think government would come to a stop frankly.’

Deputy Murray said some deputies who refused to back GST having opposed it at the 2020 election were ‘principled’ but ‘ignoring reality’.

He said he was ‘astounded’ by other deputies who voted for GST in previous States terms but were opposing the current proposals.

n Listen to the full interview with Deputy Murray on the Guernsey Press Politics Podcast — available wherever you get your podcasts, or at guernseypress.com/podcasts.