“Now we can think about getting back to the playing fields and fencing our playing fields”
The fence under construction at Stoke Lodge playing fields back in 2019(Image: BristolLive)
The headteacher of a Bristol secondary school has said she hopes to fence off the school’s playing fields once again, after the council removed the land from its register of Town and Village Greens. Jo Butler, the headteacher at Cotham School said she hoped that a recent High Court judgement in the school’s favour over the status of the land meant an end to the ‘repeated and systematic’ incidents of vandalism, which have largely destroyed or removed a fence that was erected in 2019.
In a message to parents, Ms Butler said she hoped that PE teachers and students would be able to get back to the Stoke Lodge playing fields in the near future, following the High Court ruling in early June.
Last week, Bristol City Council quietly removed the land from its official register of Town and Village Greens around Bristol, with a letter informing both Cotham School, which has a 125-year lease on the land from the city council, and the ‘We Love Stoke Lodge’ campaign group of local residents.
That followed a High Court ruling following a lengthy legal battle, which ended with the judge deciding the city council’s public rights of way committee should not have bestowed Village Green status on Stoke Lodge because it didn’t meet the legal criteria.
What happens next remains to be seen. The We Love Stoke Lodge group said they were shocked by the ‘bewildering’ decision by the judge, and wouldn’t be commenting until they had considered if or how the decision could be appealed.
School chiefs at Cotham School now have to work out how to bring PE lessons back to the playing fields. Back in 2019, the school sparked huge controversy by enclosing the vast majority of the land inside a 6ft green metal fence, which they said meant they would be able to securely and safely conduct PE lessons there.
That fence was the subject of what Cotham School headteacher said was ‘repeated’ and ‘systematic’ vandalism, so that now only a few isolated fence panels and posts remain. Since then, the council has confirmed the status of a number of public footpaths across the green space, which further complicate issues around access and rights of way, even with the High Court ruling that the entire area cannot be a Village Green, which had meant access for all over the entire area.
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In a message to parents, Cotham’s headteacher Ms Butler raised the possibility that a fence could return. Calling the council’s removal of Stoke Lodge from the Village Green register, ‘absolutely fantastic’, she said: “It’s brilliant news, so now we can think about getting back to the playing fields and fencing our playing fields so that our students can use them safely and securely and our staff can teach without disruption,” she added.
Talking about the vandalism the school experience to the fence that had been erected, Ms Butler added: “We certainly hope that now this judgement has been made that we won’t be experiencing anything like this in the future once we get back down there, and we very much hope that that is on the cards and we can just get on with delivering our curriculum, and using the playing fields for our students,” she added.
The fence at Stoke Lodge playing fields, pictured in early 2020(Image: James Beck/Freelance)
In an earlier statement, Ms Butler also told parents: “I also look forward to the day when we can secure the area, and reopen the area to members of the public when we’re not using it – which is what we have always done, despite what the narrative has been, from the time when PE lessons cease, the land is open and available to anyone in Bristol who would want to access it, the same at weekends when it’s not being used, the same as school holidays.”
A spokesperson for We Love Stoke Lodge said they believed a fence would not be necessary. “The decision (by the High Court) records that the headmistress accepted in cross-examination that Ofsted does not require perimeter fencing – in fact she claimed she never said that, which might come as a surprise to many parents.”