No space for new school in Mid Sussex expansion proposal

The proposal intends to increase the number of students at Downlands Community School, Hassocks, Warden Park Primary Academy, Haywards Heath, and Holy Trinity Church of England Primary School, Cuckfield.

Mid Sussex District Councillor Pete Bradbury said: “There should be a school proposal for Ashenground in Haywards Heath, it isn’t in there. We need the extra places in the right place.

“Ashenground is the only division in the whole of West Sussex that doesn’t have a school.”

The councillor agreed the proposal to expand Warden Park ‘makes perfect sense’.

But he said the public consultation, which ends on Tuesday, should be longer.

“The public aren’t familiar with it, it should be a normal period of 90 days rather than four weeks,” he said.

The plan is to add a form to Downlands, resulting in a rise from 210 to 240 places by September 2016.

Holy Trinity would go from 45 places to 60 places whilst Warden Park from 50 to 60 places, both by September 2015. The scheme is in part due to an increase in birth rate and in response to migration and major house building.

The individual governing bodies of each of the schools will take the decision on whether schools expand.

England’s pupil population is set to exceed eight million by 2023 for the first time in almost half a century.