Cubanbreeze

Yes to the above post. But as I said before, James, what is your plan? Or are you trying to make a virtue out of not having one? You say, slightly mindbogglingly, that "everyone who has offered their support will categorically be given a chance to withdraw their support". That's the closest we've got to a statement of intent from you: what you want is carte blanche to do whatever you want, with a promise that we, who voted you in - though did we? Really? How many, do you think? - might have a right of veto, at some future point as ill-defined as your plans are for the East Dulwich hospital site. I say again: 1. Is it a Harris? 2. Or is it going to be a School of Freedom (possibly with a nice Lib Dem involved at a senior level who has managed to jump ship before the coming Lib Dem apocalypse. Good luck with that)? And 3. Do we all have to keep asking you, again and again and again, like a bunch of Jeremy Paxmans(Paxmen?), for the answers to the first two questions. Because we will. When is the public meeting? In case you hadn't got it, people want answers. We do pay your wages, you know.

Are you saying a successful school can't run more than one site? Try telling that to the Haberdasher's Aske's Federation! Yes, I do think the Charter would be far, far more likely to maintain its popularity than some novice "free" school would be to get off the ground, with no experience whatsoever, armed only with a one-off wad of cash central government has given it to get some pupils off the books. The "failing free school" news stories are starting to roll in already, predictably. It's unconvincing to assert that it's easier to start a new school than to seek the help of an existing good one, without offering any evidence for that claim. And it's not good enough to blame the rot on past administrations while trying to further that process yourself. Yes, we need a school, urgently, but I think you need to listen to local people instead of offering them a yes/no option on something you refuse to define. Will other people on this thread join me in calling for a public meeting about the future of this site? Either that or spell it out here. What's the plan? Is it for another Harris? Or is it for a free school? If it's the latter, who is in the frame to run it?

Hello, James You're right about free schools and academies being the same thing. They are intended as a means of enticing some parents out of local authority schools in order to leave those schools as last resorts, thus "rolling back the state" in classic Thatcher/Blair style. Follow the money. Anyway, this is not the time to argue about all that. In another world, I would suggest a local authority school for the site. In the one we've got, I am going to suggest the blindingly obvious use already recommended by plenty of sensible people on this thread: let the Charter school expand. It has a proven track record of excellence, it is wildly oversubscribed, and it's just up the road. Oops, wrong answer. You'd better keep on consulting.

Hmm ... so let me get this right: you, our elected representative, are trying to manufacture the appearance of a groundswell of support for transforming what was a public hospital into a privatised education provider. Whatever next? Maybe you would like to find a state school to close and turn into a private hospital. Of course we need a secondary school, James - though, as others have pointed out, not in the one part of ED that is already well served, by the Charter school; and not yet another one run by Lord Harris, to whom education seems to be being outsourced wholesale. Pretty soon our children's life chances will depend entirely on the munificence of billionaire philathropists. It'll be like living in Whitechapel in the 19th century. Until that great day comes, though, what an inconvenient thing democracy is for you trailblazers charged with assembling a coalition of the credulous! Sixty responses so far is a bit pathetic, isn't it? Maybe after the Pisa results last week, with Sweden's ranking plummeting and its "free" schools programme now looking rather less than enviable, people are starting to smell a rat. Or maybe they are not quite as stupid as business and its facilitators in politics seem to think they are.

Well, not on the Rye but over the other side of it, to be exact. I know it's not East Dulwich, but it's very near (just next to Soper's the fishmonger on Evalina Rd). This excellent place, called Bambuni, has been open just a week, I discovered today. It sells lovely bread, salami etc, and has really good coffee. But the really clever thing is that it sells wine and olive oil from the barrel, and provides nice, re-usable bottles to put it in. The five-quid southern-French red I got there this morning certainly beats anything you'd get for that money elsewhere. And before anyone asks, no, I don't work there or know the owner.

We live just off the Bellenden Road. On Monday morning we found our shed door swinging open, as was the door to the passage that runs down the side of our house - from where we have had two bikes stolen over the last year, both at weekends. Luckily, they didn't get anything this time (and you won't in the future, either, bike thieves, if you're reading this). I wondered: has anyone else noticed anything similar recently?