Plea to save 'sanctuary' school for additional needs pupils

A village school threatened with closure must stay open to provide "sanctuary" for for its pupils with additional learning needs (ALN), councillors have said.

A consultation on plans to shut the 35-pupil Llandinam Primary School, near Newtown, Powys, attracted 745 names to a petition calling for it to be saved.

Reform UK councillor Geoff Morgan told Powys County Council on Thursday: "If we shut the school we save £34,000 a year and Powys has a budget of over £300m. This is 0.01% of the budget."

A decision on the closure will be made on Tuesday but Judith Hickey, chief officer for ALN, inclusion and wellbeing, said she was confident the pupils' needs would be met by the schools taking them in.

At the meeting of the council's learning and skills scrutiny committee, Mr Morgan issued a plea for the Liberal Democrat cabinet member for education, James Gibson-Watt, to stop the school's closure process.

He said: "We recently voted to be a council of sanctuary, a caring council, where is the sanctuary for these kids? Their sanctuary is Llandinam school."

The six-week consultation took place between September and October and 97 written responses were received.

Many of the comments opposing the closure were due to number of children with ALN that have come to Llandinam – some had been home-schooled after being taken out of other schools in the area.

Education officers said that 17% of pupils at Llandinam have ALN.

Conservative councillor Lucy Roberts added: "It's very clear there's a huge amount support for the school and the service it provides to those children who found it difficult in larger schools or mainstream education."

If plans go ahead, the school could be shut in August 2026.

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