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Why this scaremongering over site for new school?
• YOUR report (Paedophile fears over school at ‘isolated’ site, October 2) was irresponsible, ill-informed and one-sided. It quoted from a police document which did raise some concerns about the Crouch Hill site proposal but also made a number of recommendations on addressing those concerns. You failed to mention these, or get any response from Ashmount School’s head, its governors or the architects behind the scheme for any sense of balance. Neither does the police report use the language taken by your headline. You have a responsibility to avoid scaremongering on such sensitive subjects.
Furthermore, your report ignored the fact that a children’s nursery has been operating on the site for many years, with no history of any threat against the occupants. As I understand it, those involved in planning the new site have gone to great lengths to ensure the security of the children who will benefit from the development. That includes listening to police recommendations, and taking account of the views of the Parkland Walk security team (which fully supports the plan).
I’m sure your readers would have been interested to know the original source for the report. It came from a campaign group which wants Ashmount School to stay where it is. Their gardens back onto the current school site, and they are worried what might replace it. Their interest is not in the welfare of the children – it is to protect their house prices. Had your report made the source clear, it may have left your readers with a different impression.
Why don’t you try to find out why so many people support this imaginative proposal?
R Porter
Sparsholt Road, N19
• AS a governor of Ashmount and an ex-headteacher of a secondary school, I found the article about paedophiles and the Crouch Hill site alarmist and irresponsible. The relatively small number of incidents listed by the park police (Parkguard) in their monitoring report of the area does not justify the words used. Hornsey Lane is hardly some kind of crime-free oasis from which the children are being moved.
Any school anywhere (particularly a girls’ secondary school) can attract unwanted attention. School design and management address this and there is a lot of experience in north London, where many schools can feel very vulnerable.
As governors, we take the security of the children as paramount but with modern aids such as CCTV it is easier to monitor all access. In reality, children are at much greater risk from people they know, often within their own families, than from strangers.
Jane de Swiet
Hornsey Lane, N6
• AS a governor at Ashmount School, I fully support proposals to rebuild the school at the Crouch Hill site. I was therefore shocked at your scaremongering article last week, which raised security fears for the site.
There is already a fully active, thriving nursery, Bowlers, and I know that parents who have safely sent their children there for the last 20 years will not recognise the bleak picture you paint. My daughter attended the Cape Youth Project over many years without any incident.
Of even more concern is the unsettling effect your article will have had on parents, who may now worry about their children’s welfare.
The current plans, with their thoughtful design and security measures, will make the Crouch Hill site safer, as will the increase in people using the area.
And parents of children at the Bowlers nursery should be reassured that there have not been crimes or attempted crimes reported against the children there, and there is no history of “offenders with an unwelcome interest in children” frequenting the site, as your one-sided article reports.
Cllr Fiona Dunlop
Lib Dem, Hillrise ward |
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