Cut overheads not schools

I refer to your report of spurious comments of SIC services committee chairman Gussie Angus that if the council decides not to close Scalloway secondary department “each and every child in Shetland will suffer a loss of £200-worth of educational provision”.

In fact the council’s administration costs for the education of every child in Shetland are a multiple of that amount although Gussie does not seem at all sensitive to those costs.

Perhaps it seems easier for some in the council to propose sacrificing a school and its community rather than addressing the embarrassing costs of their own bureaucracy.

This is the schools services’ third attempt in recent years to close the Scalloway secondary department and it still seems to be relying on luck rather than establishing a clear educational case and for this failure this proposal should meet the same fate as its predecessors.

If as Gussie suggests it’s time to take a stand “for the good o’ all Shetland’s bairns” then I hope that the council will address its own overheads before shutting schools.

Gordon Dargie
Brough,
Hamnavoe,
Burra.