Appendix C
OBJECTIONS TO THE PROPOSED WATFORD MUSLIM SCHOOL
The Watford Muslim School Trust application to build and operate a primary school for 210 children
aged between 3 and 10 on the former Scammel site is premature and fails satisfactorily to provide
evidence of their ability to finance, construct and operate a school in a number of critical areas.
LAND ISSUES
1. The land on which it is proposed the school should be constructed was made available to
Watford Borough Council under the terms of a Section 106 agreement for the purposes of
providing a community facility for the newly erected homes on the former Scammel site.
2. It was never intended at the time the planning permission was granted that a school would be
constructed on the site. The site was envisaged as providing facilities for older members of
the local community first. With the closure of the WOPWA facility on Exchange Road, it
must now be the case that such a facility in West Watford is needed even more greatly now.
3. The Section 106 agreement is now nearly 5 years old, which raises the question as to whether
or not the agreement is legally enforceable. The developer will soon have a legal right to
seek restoration of the land, which they may now use for their own purposes. Has anyone
contacted the developer to establish if they are prepared to allow what may shortly be
considered their land to be used for the purpose of building an exclusive-intake school?
4. Has anyone consulted local residents living on the estate built on the former Scammel site? If
not, this failure to consult may be in breach of planning law and planning regulations.
FINANCIAL ISSUES
1. According to information supplied to the Charity Commission by Watford Muslim School
Trust (WMST), financial information for the period 01 Jan 2004 to 23 Apr 2005 was only
received in January 2007. The return for the period 24 Apr 2005 to 23 Apr 2006 was
originally shown as Overdue and not received until 16 January 2007 – 327 days late. The
return for the year ending 24 Apr 2006 was not received until 06 January 2009 and the return
for the year ending 30 April 2007 was not received until 31 December 2008. This failure to
provide financial information in a timely manner raises serious questions over the ability of
the WMST to maintain proper financial records and to meet financial probity requirements.
2. According to the slight financial returns provided to the Charity Commission, for the period
01 Jan 2004 to 31 Dec 2004, WMST had £2,000 Income and £2,000 Expenditure. For the
period 24 Apr 2004 to 23 Apr 2005 (which overlaps the previous period?), WMST had
£55,879 Income and £62,908 Expenditure, resulting in a financial deficit of £6,925. This
deficit was offset by a loan of £10,000 from the Crescent School Project, based in Wembley.
Attempts to find information on this Crescent School Project have been unsuccessful. This is
an unsatisfactory state of affairs as the WMST was technically bankrupt at this stage and was
being bailed out by a loan from an unknown outside organisation. The WMST trading
figures for the year ending 23 April 2006 showed income of £3,439 and spending of £667.
The trading figure for the year ending 30 April 2007 showed income of £8,615 and spending
of £6,451. Even allowing for the modest improvement in their financial situation over the
subsequent two years, WMST still clearly owe The Crescent School Project a significant
amount of money, which clearly undermines their claim to have 10% of the capital cost of
building a new school immediately available. Have WMST supplied tangible guarantees to
HCC that they have the 10% available in cash prior to the commencement of the project?
Papers being supplied to the Committee suggest that the additional revenue cost of running a
separate Muslim school in West Watford would cost only in the region of £100,000. This is a
very obvious under-estimate, bearing in mind the salary and additional on-costs of 6 full-time
teachers, a Head Teacher and possible Deputy Head Teacher, as well as administrative staff
OBJECTIONS TO THE PROPOSED WATFORD MUSLIM SCHOOL – Page 1 of 4
and education support staff, who would have to be additionally employed by a new school.
The financial implications for HCC of this proposed new school are considerable and require
much more detailed financial research and analysis than is presently available.
3. The 16 January 2007 Charity Commission return from WMST showed their Capital and
Reserves as being £151.59. On their web site, WMST claims that ‘A state funded school will
receive 100% of its running costs (salaries, etc.) from the LEA, and 85% of its capital costs
(buildings, repairs, etc.). This means Children get to go to the School for FREE!’ Can an
organisation with just £151.59 in capital and reserves be trusted to supervise the construction
and operation of a 210 child school? After making these questionable claims to prospective
parents is it any wonder that their questionable survey has elicited such a supportive
response? Regrettably, WMST have duped parents into believing their children will be
educated for free. Clearly, this is not the case. Parents will have to meet the costs of
educating their own and other children through payment inter alia of council taxes and
income tax. Has this been clearly explained to those participating in the survey which has
been claimed as being supportive of this proposal. Indeed, how rigorous is the survey? It
bears all the hallmarks of a self-selecting survey. For example, how many non-Muslims
participated in the survey? The absence of factual detail from the survey makes this aspect
impossible to determine. A 2005 Islamic Human Rights Commission survey found that only
42.9% of Muslim females and 49.7% of Muslim males preferred Muslim schooling. This
shows that a majority of adult Muslims do not want their children to attend single-faith
schools, as they recognise this leads to the ghettoisation of their children and leads to their
academic and social failure. Forcing young children into a religious-apartheid education
system does the children no good at all.
4. WMST has stated that Islamia School Trust will manage funds raised for the school, which
raises the prospect of Hertfordshire funding being managed by another organisation in the
London Borough of Brent. Is this feasible? Also, how can the public authorities be sure that
all the funding received by WMST/Islamia Trust will be allocated solely towards the
education-related costs of the school? What control will HCC have over the performance of
an externally privately-owned and operated school in West Watford?
ACADEMIC ISSUES
1. On their web site, WMST state that they will commission Islamia School Trust to: Conduct a feasibility study on the viability of the school in the proposed area
 Prepare an application for state funding
 Recruit all teaching and administrative staff
 Assist with timetabling and curriculum
 Possibility of appointing someone managing funds raised
 Have an arms-length oversight of the school, once it is up and running
This appears to indicate that WMST itself has no expertise in setting up and/or running a school.
They are clearly highly reliant upon the Islamia School Trust – based in the London Borough of
Brent – to take care of all these aspects for them and will be making little if any original input into
the project. There is a danger that people from outside of Watford and Hertfordshire will take over a
local public asset for their own purposes, without a clear oversight by any local public body.
2.
WMST make many academic claims for the Islamia School in Brent but their 2006-2007
KS1-KS2 CVA result was 99.7 – clearly less than the Hertfordshire County average CVA
score. Although they achieved an average point score of 28.4, this suggests that their results
were achieved through a “cherry-picking” process, which will not materially assist underachievers in the West Watford area. Their percentage of sessions missed through overall
absence was 4.7% and 2.6% for unauthorised absences, which suggests that they operate a
more lax attendance policy than is expected in most Hertfordshire schools. Although WMST
has stated that education of SEN pupils will be a major factor for them, the Islamia School
Trust in 2006/07 had just 5.5% of pupils with statements of SEN or supported at School
Action Plus and 8.3% of pupils with SEN, supported at School Action. This compares to a
Hertfordshire average of 9.7% and 10.6% [and England averages of 10.0% and 13.4%],
OBJECTIONS TO THE PROPOSED WATFORD MUSLIM SCHOOL – Page 2 of 4
which reinforces the impression of “cherry-picking” by Islamia Trust School in order to
achieve better than average results. With the WMST School being so heavily reliant upon
Islamia School Trust for their academic provision, it is an open question as to whether they
would be able adequately to cater for pupils requiring special educational needs provision.
3.
On the WMST web site they provide a number of Questions and Answers, one of which is ‘If
something in the Curriculum did not meet or was not suited under Islamic teaching … would
you not teach it? The answer given to this question is ‘WMS Trust would teach it, if it was
mandatory, but may address the topic with the Islamic viewpoint.’ Much of the guidance
received by schools from the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DfCSF) is of a
non-mandatory nature, which suggests that the proposed school would be able to ignore such
guidance. Their answer also raises the question as to how effectively they would be able to
teach the largely non-secular values of British society. Could they actually teach theories
such as evolution through natural selection satisfactorily or would they prefer to advance the
largely discredited theory of so-called “intelligent design” instead? Would they be able
genuinely to teach the humanistic values of atheism and agnosticism? Can they teach about
Christianism, Judaism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Paganism, et al. as being equal in worth and
value as Islamism? The answer they give above provides no reassurance on this point.
4.
Ibrahim Lawson reportedly said on Beyond Belief (Radio 4, March 2003): “the essential
purpose of the Islamia school as with all Islamic schools is to inculcate profound religious
belief in the children”. Is this the same Islamia Trust School as the one selected by WMST to
run their West Watford School? Does this suggest that the children will be the recipients of a
balanced curriculum offer at the proposed Watford Muslim School?
5.
Recent research by HCC Officers has revealed that there will be a surplus of primary school
places in West Watford over the next few years. If this school is allowed to proceed, it would
effectively undermine the viability of existing county primary schools. Longer term, all local
primary schools – including this proposed religious school – could be fatally undermined by a
much greater surplus of places, which would place HCC under pressure to close some of its
own local primary schools and/or watch the WMST school become liquidated.
SOCIETAL ISSUES
1.
In a report on a survey conducted on their behalf, the WMST quoted around 250 local
Muslim residents as supporting the idea of a local Muslim school. According to the 2001
Census, 4,869 persons (6% of Watford residents) described themselves as Muslims. Clearly,
support from barely 5% of the local Muslim population is hardly a justification for this type
of school. Even their more recent survey At national level, the numbers describing
themselves as Muslims in 2001 represented just 2.7% of the total British population. Among
Muslim parents, most do not want their children educated separately from other children. A
growing majority of young people regard themselves as being agnostic or atheistic.
2.
In a Harris Poll conducted for the Financial Times in December 2006, 70% of those polled
agreed that the Church and State should be kept separate in Modern Europe. In an ICM Poll
conducted for The Guardian in December 2006, only 33% described themselves as a
religious person, while 63% described themselves as not religious. This provides clear
evidence that Britain today is becoming increasingly secular, which underlines the fact that
setting up exclusive selection schools is not what people actually want to happen today.
3.
The 2003 Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations make it possible to
discriminate against existing or prospective employees on religious grounds. This privately
owned school would presumably be covered by these regulations and would be free not only
to discriminate against employees – and, possibly, parents and pupils – on religious grounds
but would also receive exemptions from the Employment Equality (Sexual Orientation)
Regulations 2003: Regulations 6 and 7; they would be free to discriminate on grounds of
sexuality or sexual orientation. Pay and career progression could presumably be determined
by how a person’s religious belief or practice was assessed by the senior leadership team of
the proposed Muslin School. This lack of human rights protection for employees and service
users - which is an outcome of religious organisations being exempt from human rights laws cannot be accepted as a basis for the proper use of public funds.
OBJECTIONS TO THE PROPOSED WATFORD MUSLIM SCHOOL – Page 3 of 4
4.
Part of the argument for separate religious schools is that they provide separate-but-equal
facilities for consumers of their own religious product. However, this is exactly the same
argument used by racists in the United States Deep South before racial segregation was
abolished. This kind of reverse-provision risks setting up ghettoes or corrals for young
people, from within which they will find it extremely hard to break out and take on an
inclusive and interactive role within mainstream British society.
APPENDIX
Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations 2003: Regulations 6 and 7
If being of a particular religion or belief is a ‘genuine and determining occupational requirement’ for
a job and it is ‘proportionate to apply that requirement’ then any employer may discriminate against
potential applicants for jobs on grounds of religion or belief in the arrangements they make for the
purpose of determining to whom they should offer the job, by refusing to offer - or deliberately not
offering - someone the job. They may also discriminate against current employees in the
opportunities which they afford her/him for promotion, a transfer, training, or any other benefit and
by refusing to afford her/him - or deliberately not affording her/him - any such opportunity.
They can also discriminate against current employees by dismissing them.
Employers that have an ‘ethos based on religion or belief’ only need to show that there is a
‘genuine occupational requirement’ in order to discriminate in these ways.
Employment Equality (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2003: regulations 6 and 7
If the employment is for ‘purposes of an organised religion’, the employer may, ‘so as to comply
with the doctrines of the religion’ or ‘because of the nature of the employment and the context in
which it is carried out…to avoid conflicting with the strongly held religious convictions of a
significant number of the religion's followers’, may discriminate against potential applicants for jobs
on grounds of sexual orientation in the arrangements they make for the purpose of determining to
whom they should offer the job, by refusing to offer - or deliberately not offering - someone the job.
They may also discriminate against current employees in the opportunities which they afford her/him
for promotion, a transfer, training, or any other benefit and by refusing to afford her/him - or
deliberately not affording her/him - any such opportunity. They can also discriminate against current
employees by dismissing them.
The same issues as above apply to these exemptions from the employment equality laws. In the case
of religious schools, which have exemptions under the Education and Inspections Act 2006,
employers are able to discriminate on perceived personal ‘moral’ behaviour of the employee, for
example if a male head teacher lives with his male partner (ATL, 2007).
OBJECTIONS TO THE PROPOSED WATFORD MUSLIM SCHOOL – Page 4 of 4