18 October 2005

Ginninderra High P&C Considering Legal Action

| Samuel Gordon-Stewart
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Ginnenderra District High School’s P&C are considering legal action against the proposed K-10 Super School. The P&C claim to have been told by the government that there will be no consultation, and that the minister is not interested in any other location.

The P&C hasn’t officially decided whether or not to pursue legal action yet, but they are seeking legal advice to see if they have a case.

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True, Mr X. But I wasn’t meaning to comment on their prospective chances of success, more the fact that even to get to court in the first place you have to have a cause of action. You can’t just go to court and say “the Minister did something I disagree with”! You have to point to some breach of the law. So what I am saying is, what are they going to court for? Are they alleging some error in making an administrative decision? Or a breach of some other law? What?

smackbang – going to the courts doesn’t necessarily mean you expect to win. You can just tie things up for as long as you want… Save the Ridge seeming to be a case in point.
That said, I have some symapathy for the P+C in its struggles with our consultative dictatorship

it’s a thin line, but on the basis that the government are meant to be there representing them, yet they (the government) have told them there will be no consultation and they are going ahead on the whim of the chief indian.

Actually that’s enough to get them booted out of government in most South Pacific nations.

And what form of legal remedy would the P+C be seeking?! On what basis? I struggle to see how they can challenge this. They can whinge and moan but I don’t think they’ll have much luck in the courts.

Well while I can think of better things to protest such as new roads going through your scenic backyard area in the Black Mountain Tower area, I fully support the fact that if a P&C group has been informed by the CM that there wouldn’t be any consultation with them and that the decision was final, that they had a right and a cause to be a little bit distraught with the system.

It’ll also be a good little taste to stan the man at how a little bit of legal action can really hamper your progress.

Areaman, perhaps they nominally thought that it was a good idea until they read the fine print ?

As you know it wouldn’t be the first time that somebody has taken a closer look at something that the Governmunt is proposing and found that there was a dodgy undertone.

Infact, while this legal action is going on, it might be a good time to get a revised study underway to check the communities true feelings on the matter, and not just ask the people passing through Jerrabomberra kindy in the morning whether or not they think half the schools in Belconnen should close or not. (for an extra teacher at the school in J of course)

Saying that the Ginnenderra District P&C (who were orginally for the plan, but jumped on the “we want to keep a high school with poor educational outcomes and 120 students open” bandwagon later) might do something, or might not isn’t so important that it needs to be reported right away. Surely it’ll keep until they actually decide.

Samuel Gordon-Stewart5:52 pm 18 Oct 05

Well if I could find a direct quote I would have used it. I was rather hoping that ABC online had covered the story, but they hadn’t at the time of posting (and still haven’t). I deliberately avoided naming the radio station I heard the story on because people around here usually accuse me of being sponsored by them when I do.

2CC had a direct quote from the P&C, but I didn’t record it, and therefore could write it. After ten minutes with Google I gave up and just wrote the story…if anybody has more info then I would be glad to hear about it, but you can’t expect me to ignore a fairly important story just becuase I can’t find an online source.

What a waste of a story. No new information, no facts to back it up, no final decision, not even anything first hand from the P&C.

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