Wednesday September 13 | 2017
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Tonbridge school’s new sister annexe is an ‘extension of selection by stealth’
INSIDE
Dragon Boat Race proves a roaring success
ALDI CHOOSES TOWN
New budget supermarket comes to Cannon Lane site Page 3
By Andy Tong THE controversial new ‘annexe’ to the Weald of Kent grammar school opened its doors on Friday [September 8]. But there was no sign of the furore surrounding it abating. Headmistress Maureen Johnson insists that the satellite site on Seal Hollow Road, ten miles from the original on Tonbridge’s Tudeley Lane, is the same school, just in a different place.
PHOTO: Sean Aidan Photography
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Loophole But campaigners continue to object that the annexe – the first grammar provision to be built in Britain for more than half a century – is actually a new school built using a loophole in the law. Pupils at Sevenoaks will attend the Tonbridge site for one day out of every fortnight. Tony Blair’s government banned the building of any new grammars in 1998. Lucy Powell, Labour MP for Manchester Central, will chair an early-day motion in Parliament this week that the annexe is a back-door route to new selective provision. On behalf of the campaign group Comprehensive Future, she will describe it as ‘the first new selective state school to open in Britain for over 50 years’ and will call on the government ‘to rule out any further extension of selection by stealth’. See pages 8-9
MAKE A SPLASH: The fifth annual Dragon Boat Race saw 374 competitors battling it out for bragging rights and raising funds for a plethora of charities, while residents lined the banks of the Medway and enjoyed a range of stalls along the renovated River Walk. See page 2
G4S patient transport failings are exposed by driver whistle-blower By Murray Jones and Adam Hignett DRIVERS for patient transport provider G4S face regular battles with an indifferent management obsessed with hitting targets, but they have scored a small victory over how they treat the terminally sick.
Ignored The revelation comes from a G4S whistle blower who approached the Times after reading its ongoing investigation into how
the multi-national company runs West Kent’s patient transport service. Sean Woods (not his real name), who is a driver for the firm, lifts the lid on a culture in which front-line staff regularly have their concerns ignored by a management team. In his interview, Mr Woods also revealed: n Staff in the G4S control room ‘blatantly lie’ to patients about how long they will be kept waiting. n There is little accountability among the management, who address concerns with ‘a shrug’.
n Frontline staff doubt that patient transport will ever improve while G4S remain at the helm. However, in one area those on the front line ‘made such a fuss’ that they were able to secure some desirable change. Mr Woods said: “This was in how they treated those on their way to receive palliative care, who until recently ‘had no priority’.” For the full story see page 7
Tonbridge features strongly in ‘exceptional’ awards Page 2
ANGELS’ KINDNESS Fans help family of former player with tumour Page 4
TJS SUFFER VERTIGO Promoted Juddians fall to first defeat in a year Page 86