Court battle to save Co Down school from closure ends in disappointment for campaigners

​A judge ruled today that the authorities were legally entitled to approve shutting down St Anne’s Primary in Donaghadee and reject an alternative proposal for it to transform to integrated status.

Mr Justice Scoffield said: “In the end, the difficulties with the school’s future sustainability posed by the low enrolment numbers and the Department of Education’s assessment of the forecast future enrolment numbers were simply too great.”

St Anne’s, which first opened back in 1932, had only 58 registered pupils during the last academic year.

In June, the Department accepted a recommendation by the Council for Catholic Maintained Schools that it should close due to falling numbers.

A counter-proposal by the school’s Board of Governors to convert to integrated status - which drew overwhelming support from parents - was denied. The decision was based on falling enrolment levels and concerns about its ability to meet sustainability criteria. The school’s closure date is currently set for October 31.

Lawyers representing a pupil at St Anne’s mounted a judicial review challenge to the Department’s decision making process.

They alleged a failure to adapt criteria when the Integrated Education Act (Northern Ireland) 2022 came into force last October - after consultation periods on the competing proposals had closed.

The Department did not properly consider its duties to support integrated education or conduct a required fresh consultation process, it was contended. But even with those new obligations, Mr Justice Scoffield held that the Permanent Secretary was entitled to decide it would not be right to approve St Anne’s bid for transformed status.

“The Board of Governors’ own projected enrolment figures were still well below the minimum thresholds for a sustainable primary school,” he pointed out.

The judge accepted the Department arguably failed to comply with a newly imposed duty for further consultation with the Integrated Education Fund and the Northern Ireland Council for Integrated Education.

However, with both bodies having engaged in the earlier process, he decided that compliance would not have altered the outcome.

“As strong a case for approval of the transformation proposal was made as reasonably could be,” he said.

“It is abundantly clear in this case that the Department carefully considered each of the sustainability criteria and their associated indicators.”

Mr Justice Scoffield confirmed: “It was lawful for the Department to reach the decisions which it did on the two development proposals at issue in these proceedings.”

Dismissing the legal challenge, he acknowledged his ruling would be a disappointment for those campaigning to save a school assessed by inspectors as having “very good” leadership and management.

The judge also acknowledged how governors were only informed of the Department’s decision shortly before it was made public, with some members of staff finding out about the risk to their jobs through social media.

He added: “I note that the Permanent Secretary has rightly expressed sincere apologies for the hurt and anxiety which may have resulted from this.”