How will you vote in the EU referendum? (Thread 2)

Possibly this has been covered before, I don't have time to wade through all the posts on a very extensive thread. Whilst watching "The Agenda" last night, one of the guests, Alison Pearson made some salient points, after George Osborne had droned on and on about the financial implications of coming out of the EU, allegedly every family will be in the region of £4000 pa worse off. AP pointed out that there are other aspects to take into account such as the quality of our lives.

We now have a major crisis as far as junior school places are concerned, my borough Richmond upon Thames is one of the areas that have been highlighted as being hit hard by a burgeoning population and a scarcity of school places. We don't need the media, the government or any other source to tell any of us what we experience in our own backyard. When my older child started nursery school in the late '80s I could have put his name down for half a dozen local schools and we could have had our choice of any one of them. Now some are not even getting their 6th choice. My children's infant school has been rebuilt and has doubled in size and it's intake, as indeed have many others in the borough and added to that their are numerous new schools and yet STILL we don't have enough places. Of course this won't affect GO because as we know he is sending his two through the private system, but what of the remaining 93% who will be educating their children in the state system.

Added to that, as anyone who lives in the South East will know, it's incredibly expensive to rent or God forbid buy, so where are our young supposed to live? It's all very well saying that in parts Britain is still very empty, empty it may well be but most people want to live where they know they can earn a living, whilst I appreciate some areas are gloriously empty they also have little in the way of businesses and industry. My children work in London and as such have to be in striking distance, of the capital for some that can mean a 30 to 40 mile train journey and I know from those who do such a journey that incurs an annual season ticket in the region of £4,000 pa plus. On Andrew Marr's Sunday morning politics programme Yvette Cooper made a mealy mouthed admission that possibly Labour allowed too many in too quickly but somehow Labour seem not to equate x million more people coming here with the foresight that her own and now the Conservative government should both have had in putting in place the appropriate infra structure to support those numbers. I don't have time to read links and in any case I'm particularly skeptical of how unbiased those sources would be given that our own government presents us with skewed information at times.

My personal preference would be to stay in a reformed EU, but I'm also highly skeptical that we have any such influence to change it for the better. On last Thursday's QT, two such disparate voices as EU MP Daniel Hannan who has never hidden his antipathy towards the EU but more surprisingly prospective Green Mayoral candidate Jenny Jones were unanimous in their condemnation. A corrupt and ineffectual body that cannot be reformed. It seems that lobbyists, big business with vested interests carry far more sway than our government.

Terribull if there is a shortage of school places in places like Richmond (where the voters elected Zac Goldsmith, Tory) it will be because Michael Gove (Tory) when secretary of state for education in the coalition government stopped local authorities from building new schools, asserting that "free schools" would provide necessary places.
There is at least one of these i the borough www.deerparkschool.org.uk
However the problem with starting new schools is finding suitable accommodation. This school refers to the fact they will only "move to their permanent site" in Sept 201 and until then spaces are limited.
A free school does not have a remit to provide the right number of places according to the borough's needs.

I'd be amazed if the population of Richmond has shot up due to immigration - its a densely built up area with extremely high property values. You'd have to be a very wealthy immigrant to move there. But wherever these extra children have come from - the blame for lack of places lies squarely with the previous government.

London is a victim of its own success - and of the face that no one has taken responsibility for building new housing for workers. It's a simple equation - a booming economy sucking in hard-working talent from all over UK, from the whole EU and beyond. Without these new Londoners there could not be a booming economy. But where all the workers are supposed to live? It's not the fault of the EU, or the people who moe to London to meet its ever-growing need for workers.

A possible solution might be leave the EU, depress the economy and encourage some of those talented, hard-working people to leave town.

Anyway, I'm pleased to report that the Royal College of Midwives believes we should stay in :

www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/apr/18/royal-college-of-midwives-supportive-of-britains-eu-membership

TerriBull, I don't know whether you're aware that there have been a number of threads on Mumsnet about education in Richmond.

The problems has indeed been caused by the local authority's inability to plan and build its own schools. It started years ago when the government of the day stated that pupils didn't have to go to a school in their own authority and encouraged people to think they had a choice.

Richmond has problems because many of its own pupils try to get into the Kingston grammar schools, which means the 'cream' has gone. Meanwhile, it attracts pupils from neighbouring authorities. Sink schools have been allowed to develop.

The problem in Richmond is not so much to do with a growing population, but a lack of schools which people think desirable.

I'm unclear what this has to do with the EU.

JessM - Richmond on Thames borough does encompass places such as Feltham, Whitton, Hounslow which are on the boundary and quite different from Richmond town itself which is full of very expensive properties, but only a small proportion of the population of the borough live in those. Nevertheless, I would agree that properties to rent and buy are higher than the national average. When I am out on the streets of Kingston which is often, I can tell you that the Eastern European presence is very much in evidence in the language all around us. This is merely an observation. I myself am only part English, my grandfather arrived in this country with very little money as a young man, married my grandmother and built a small business. My first husband was also foreign. It's the numbers without the infra structure that bother me. I do know from conversations with others that pockets of newly arrived immigrants live in Richmond Borough. I also know when I pass my children's old infants school that I hear mothers picking up their children speaking in what I perceive is Polish. Very near where I live is a convent/retired priests home and they hold mass in Polish on Sundays, so one would assume that those that attend mass there are Polish and similarly many more are part of the congregation of Catholic churches in this area so again assume that they live nearby. My cleaner, a lovely Polish lady hired by my husband not me, lives in Sunbury on Thames and she has a community of Polish people around her. My children left school a while ago so I am not up to date with the schooling situation as those on Mumsnet would be. I can tell you that existing schools have been expanded and a fair number of new ones have been built. The point I was trying to make that there seemed be a lack of foresight in catering for a vast number of people that have arrived here.

Daphnedill - As far as the grammar schools in Kingston are concerned the state ones Tiffin Boys and Tiffin Girls and further out Nonsuch. I believe take people from outside the Kingston Borough, as far away as Brighton I have heard. Annoyingly a percentage of the pupils will come from private prep schools and thus have an unfair advantage. The competition to get a place in them is fierce. The other grammar school Kingston Grammar is a private school. The percentage of Asian pupils in Tiffin Grammar Boys in particular greatly out number white pupils. This is an observation not a criticism it is very clear to see when the pupils mass in the town and no doubt reflects the aspirational values within those communities and sometimes the pressure their parents put on them. Yes it's true that children crossed boroughs to attend schools in Richmond, often from Wandsworth, but I gather of late that is not the case. I know one senior school in Richmond that was viewed as dire a few years ago and turned itself around once the school's pupils were drawn from it's own borough.

All those owning a house will want prices to rise,
I'm not sure about that, though durhamjen. Perhaps not All, as quite a lot of people I know who are home owners wouldn't mind house prices dropping if it meant their children could buy their own homes.

The people who would be affected by a price drop would be any who bought at the top of the market and who would be left in negative equity as happened before.

We lived in a district of Richmond-upon-Thames many years ago and I can tell you that there was a problem with school places just as we were leaving - and a large influx of families from elsewhere who seemed to take priority over long-term residents for nursery and school places.
DD was offered a nursery place which we did not take up as we moved; her little friend was top of the waiting list for months - but was not offered the place as there were about 10 children who suddenly appeared from out of the Borough who apparently had 'greater need'.

I thought that Hounslow was a Borough in its own right (not in Richmond) and encompassed Hanworth, Feltham, Whitton etc.

Terri,

Yes, I know about Tiffins. My father and uncle and one of their cousins were pupils and I found boxes of Old Tiffinian magazines in my father's loft when he died. Other cousins went to Kingston Grammar and another was a teacher at the girls' school. I also know that the number of pupils with Asian-sounding names at both Tiffs schools and Kingston Grammar is high and you're right - parents from an Asian background are often very aspirational, which is why pupils come from such a wide catchment area. The Essex grammar schools have recently imposed a distance limit on places and have changed the entrance exam, so that it's more difficult to cram.

My point is that when there is a densely populated area like Richmond and parents can choose places in neighbouring authorities, which wasn't the case until the 1990s, and local authorities aren't allowed to build their own schools, there was always going to be a problem. It's not so much a lack of foresight as not being allowed to plan. Of course the sharp-elbowed middle classes, who can afford to rent in catchment areas or send their offspring to private schools, don't really care.

I feel disinclined to believe the "£4,300" threat; firstly because the government's ability to make financial forecasts is unimpressive, secondly because neither they nor anyone else truly know what the economic effects of leaving might be and thirdly because they constantly tell us things that are untrue: academies raise standards, the absence of new LA schools will be filled by new free schools, the junior doctors' new contract will make them better off etc. etc.

I think it smacks of desperation to be honest - if they can suggest that each family will be x worse off, then they can guarantee some panic voting, even though the figure is derived from dividing GNP by the number of households, which does not mean that each family will be that much worse off, but that there will be less money floating about in the economy (which is itself unproven) and some things might change in general services etc. They have given the impression that this is the amount by which each family's income might drop. This is what I call dirty tricks. But no more than one might expect from this lot.

Terri are you talking EU constituency/area boundaries when you say Richmond encompasses Hounslow/Feltham etc because it certainly does not encompass them in UK terms - they are next door Boroughs and have been for many many years. Richmond has always encompassed Twickenham and places such as Ham. Heston and Isleworth borough amalgamated with Feltham Urban District and Chiswick to create the London Borough of Hounslow making it stretch from Heathrow to Hammersmith. Richmond had its own amalgamation and is now sandwiched between Hounslow and Kingston.

Yes, when we lived there we could choose from any secondary school (for DD1) out of 11 (as far as I recall) in the Borough plus one in neighbouring Sunbury. I don't remember any pupils from outside the Borough applying.
One of DD's friends went to Tiffin Girls'
However, we moved away to where there was no choice at all (without an impossible journey).

According to the posters on Mumsnet, there are now pupils coming from outside the borough. Some come from Hounslow. Others failed the 11+ in Kingston and parents would rather their children went to a comprehensive than what is effectively a secondary modern in Kingston.

I live in an area where there has been virtually no choice for years and the local comprehensive has gained from the situation. It's now heavily over-subscribed, but that's not caused by immigrants, but by the people who have moved into the new housing and are attracted by the school, which has been a victim of its own success. It would be far better if children just went to their local school and local authorities were allowed to plan for population growth.

I was always astonished when we lived there at the extreme competitiveness of some of the parents.

Oh dear, wandering from the OP.

I still am undecided. Must read more, but have been very busy.

In the fifties when we still had the 11+ there were no Grammar schools at all within our area and just one secondary modern. So when we passed the exam we knew we would need to travel. At the time I lived near Heathrow in a small village (hard to believe now) and went to school in Isleworth - bus into Hounslow and a trolley bus from there. Although it was further in miles it was a much easier journey than some friends who went to Ashford. One of my friends went to the girl's grammar school in Richmond - I was so glad my Dad did not put that down as one of my choices - a difficult journey but also they had a brown uniform and that has never been my colour! No real catchment areas at that time.

Welshwife Do you mean Gumley House? Catholic girls school - uniform still brown ugh! Apologies, Hounslow and Feltham may well fall outside the Richmond Borough but they are very close to Richmond.

daphnedill - I bow to the superior knowledge of Mumsnet regarding schools

Terri No - I think it was Richmond girl's Grammar school. I went to a co-ed grammar school - it was next to Isleworth Fire station but now in a new building at Lampton and the name has changed and of course now a comp. the old building ( built by Pears of soap fame) is now part of West London College. At the time I was at school there was a Boys Grammar school up the road and also a a girls school at Syon Corner.

WW Ah not having heard of it, I've just googled it and see it closed in 1974.

Terri I dare say it suffered the fate of becoming a comprehensive or amalgamating with another school to become one.

Jalima,

I remember reading the threads about the new free school in Richmond and the extreme competitiveness of the school situation struck me. People seem to start their planning and scheming when their children are still in the womb! They seem think their life is over if they don't get their first choice for their children.

The threads on Mumsnet were because there's a new free school in Richmond. From what I could gather, there were places in the borough, but not in the schools people wanted. Richmond is planning a new secondary school, but it couldn't go ahead because of government restrictions and because there were still places available in some schools, so it's not simply a question of too many pupils (from the EU or anywhere else). Like all of London and county borders, the situation is complicated by pupils going to schools in different boroughs.

So glad we don't live there any more!

I remember parents with stopwatches at the Inter-school sports and swimming galas, yelling and urging their children on, shouting that they were a second behind their previous best!
These were 9-11 year olds

However, where the DGD live they are building a new comprehensive with fewer pupil numbers. Should be finished by the time DGD1 is ready to start.
And apparently the number of parents applying for private school places is down there.

My business deals with mostly middle aged middle class women. Last month I held a mini election of 45 votes 20 were out, 12 in and 13 don't know.
Reasons were varied, all the outs just want to be rid of the whole thing, the ins either don't want to queue at immigration or have homes on the continent. One of my clients is a friend of the Cameron's and David is such a nice boy!!

I think that whatever you decide IN or OUT it won't make any difference to the amount of school places in Richmond. In the EU schools are managed not only by the different countries themselves but by different areas in those countries.
Leaving the EU will cause as many problems as staying in when you think of the thousands of contracts signed by elected MEPs from the UK. Most decisions are made by democratically elected MEPs and there are judges and lawyers from the UK as well. The OUT people behave as if the UK has had no hand in what the EU is now. It was their MEPs and their lawyers and judges who sat in on these important decisions.

I think that whatever you decide IN or OUT it won't make any difference to the amount of school places in Richmond.
MargaretX I don't know how we got side-tracked on to that!

In what way was Leave optimistic? Did it suggest any realistic and concrete alternatives? (Just asking)

Jalima, I think the suggestion was that immigrants were causing a shortage of school places.