Tag Archives: City Academy

CAN’T PAY? YOU CAN’T PLAY!

Do you remember when footie was a simple game? Four jumpers and a ball and children of all ages could enjoy a kickabout? Those days have gone, as the national game becomes a COMMODITY TO CONSUME supported by the Football Association and million pound companies pretending to educate children, like the Cabot Learning Federation.

The City Academy in East Bristol, recently RIPPED UP their astroturf to lay a state of the art 4G playing surface. The youth football teams that trained there were told to train elsewhere for a couple of months and return to a lovely playing surface to improve their skills.

Then the trouble started. The cowboys employed to do the work, ripped it all up, and then announced that the drainage was substandard and that would be ANOTHER £250K please. Remember that old chestnut? I do. My Nan was conned by a gang driving around, promising new tarmac paths and disappearing over the hill after they ripped them up. They came back, after their poor victims had been housebound for a couple of weeks, and DEMANDED MORE MONEY.

The only difference between these two sets of fucking spivs, is my Nan’s lot got nicked. The one’s that CONNED the Academy and the children of East Bristol, will probably get an OBE and BONUSES on their shares.

After much wrangling between the suits, a price was agreed and the pitch was laid. Hooray! The FA said on their website while celebrating the new pitch, that “by providing more high-quality facilities, coupled with coaching at the appropriate age group, the Premier League and The FA Facilities Fund aims to improve the experience for regular players as well as attracting new players to the game. Many of the new state-of-the-art facilities will serve to strengthen the connection between professional football clubs and their local communities, PARTICULARLY IN THE MOST DEPRIVED AREAS OF THE COUNTRY, through the professional clubs’ community trusts’ outreach work.”

What a load of bollox. Instead parents, players and coaches are now being told that they now have to FORK OUT for new boots to be able to use the state of the art pitch. This was never explained prior and these boots range from £40 upwards. The youth football teams star many children from single parent families, families on benefits and, even, refugees without access to benefits. They are told that they CANNOT WEAR astro trainers, or moulded boots. They must be Nikes or Adidas. Worse still, coaches are expected to turn away poor children, and some have.

Stories abound of crying kids being turned away. One parent told The BRISTOLIAN, “I have 3 boys, so that’s over £150, plus the kit, and the weekly subs. We have to go to foodbanks to make ends meet. That is the end of it for us.”

One coach close to The BRISTOLIAN said “I’m not spending my coaching time turning kids away. I do this to include, not exclude. My team is losing players, because they are poor.”

Is this the SOCIAL CLEANSING of our football? Will future World Cup squads just be made up of middle class kids, who can afford various boots? Why can’t players wear astro turf trainers on astro turf and then wear them to school as many do at present? SPORT SHOULD BE FOR ALL, not just the well to do. They have taken our swimming pools, libraries and now they’re after our football.

Enough now surely?

“WE ARE WINNING!” HOW CONFIDENTIAL SOURCES, TIPSTERS & WHISTLEBLOWERS HELPED ‘THE BRISTOLIAN’ BREAK THE BIG NEWS IN THE CITY…

HORSEWORLD

We originally exposed £80k-per-year HorseWorld boss Mark ‘Not That One’ Owen’s madcap plans to fund his ailing equine charity by building on the greenbelt back in May.

We’ve subsequently reported how his plans were rejected by a BANES planning committee and how the overpaid and under-performing charity boss now plans to stay put – despite his DISASTROUS MANAGEMENT – whilst making dedicated animal welfare staff redundant, closing the revenue-generating Visitor Centre, and generally running the whole operation down.

Hopefully this story will not end on that note, though…

CITY ACADEMY

Also in May we revealed that a row over racism was breaking out at the city’s most multicultural school.

This was confirmed in January when an employment tribunal found that a black member of staff had been refused a management post for a project to raise attainment among black kids at the school due to INSTITUTIONAL RACISM. The £43k job instead went to a white teacher – thus maintaining an all-white management team at a school, 70% of whose pupils come from a BME background.

HOLMWOOD HOUSE

We exposed this privately run for-profit ’HOME OF HORRORS’ back in December.

Since then the care home’s multiple problems have been reported by BBC Bristol, the Nazi Post, Bristol 24/7 and now nationally on BBC Radio 5.

WELLINGTON HILL PLAYING FIELDS

Following our report in November about council managers using outright lies to try to block this open space in Bishopston from being protected as a public amenity, the council has executed a rapid u-turn and registered the land as a ‘Town Green’.

Clearly senior council bosses decided that sending junior managers in to a quasi-judicial setting to tell porkie pies on their behalf was not going to work any longer.

We have also learned that hold-ups in the voluntary registration of land at Laundry Fields in Fishponds have vanished since The BRISTOLIAN highlighted them.

…So a big THANK YOU to all of the whistleblowers, well-placed sources and tipsters.

Without your inside information we would not be able to EXPOSE Bristol’s bent bosses, incompetent council chiefs or hypocrites in high office.

Together we CAN make a difference and build a better city for all!

“RACIST BOSSES” SCANDAL RUMBLES ON AT FLAGSHIP BRISTOL ACADEMY…

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Following our exclusive exposé in May of the INSTITUTIONAL RACISM scandal rocking east Bristol’s City Academy, an employment tribunal in December backed up everything we said back in The BRISTOLIAN #4.3.

However, despite the official findings showing that major improvements need to be made in management, it seems that old habits die hard: STAFF WERE KEPT IN THE DARK until 23 January, shortly before the media storm hit. Completely coincidentally, Gill Kelly has so far kept her job as Principal… But has been DUMPED as head of the One World Learning Trust.

Whether that’s due to white supremacist attitudes of the school’s bosses or poorer exam results than expected isn’t yet clear…

SELF-POLICING ACADEMY IN RACISM ROW

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‘No institutional racism here’ says accused institution – case closed!

Definitely nothing to see here – so says head teacher Gill Kelly

Over in Redfield is City Academy, a secondary school for 1,100 youngsters and one of the largest employers in East Bristol. Like the ward in which it sits, Easton – where up to 40% of residents are from Black & Minority Ethnic (BME) backgrounds – it’s a diverse environment, both across the student body and in its staff.

So you would think that when a black worker complained of INSTITUTIONAL RACISM, a full and proper investigation would ensue – to weed out any racists, to ensure a better environment for pupils and adults alike, and to reassure local people that such prejudice would not be tolerated in the community’s school.

Well, think again. A staff member directly affected by what they considered racism wrote to colleagues asking them to come forward if they had any similar experience at the Academy.

Within minutes an email came down from the office of Gill Kelly, the Executive Principal. The message was clear: ‘there is no institutional racism at City Academy’, END OF DISCUSSION. So concluded the fastest investigation in living memory – the (white) headteacher had spoken, and so no further action was needed.

Meanwhile, Kelly was also undertaking a major restructuring, making MANY STAFF REDUNDANT thanks to budget cuts so deep the school’s ability to teach is threatened. Some affected had served the school for twenty years, going back to when it was state funded in the days before the One World Learning Trust was given responsibility to run it in 2003.

So staff decided to have a send-off for their ‘downsized’ colleagues, with nibbles in the school canteen after students had departed for the day. ‘Not on your nelly,’ said Kelly, who cancelled the party, just in case anyone mentioned the topics of racism or speedy investigations. And then she phoned in sick. She may well have been sick, but not half as sick as the staff are of her.

The employees being made redundant were then individually ‘helped’ off the premises in an attempt to segregate them from other staff members. What a way to treat people after years of service! Needless to say, they all met down the boozer anyway for a good chinwag…

Of course, the way senior management at City treats staff is no surprise to many workers, not least to those from nearby Bannerman Road primary, which ‘federated’ with the Academy last year in what was meant to be a partnership of equals. However, once the signatures were dry, the original agreement was IGNORED, and Kelly installed herself as line manager of Bannerman Road’s Ofsted-commended headteacher Paula Shore. And guess what? Shore is, yes, black.

Just because you are an academy, and answerable to nobody but your own board of directors, does not mean you can ignore the issue of institutional racism, or concerns of BME workers in our community’s school.

So conduct a proper investigation, you bastards!

NEW BRISTOLIAN HITS THE STREETS

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The latest edition of Bristol’s premier investigative scandal sheet is out now, packed with the stories that the other papers can’t be bothered to cover, including…

‘THREATS’ OVER DOCKS DEATH

Rush to silence whistleblowers over ‘accidental death of a cyclist’ that could have been avoided

SELF-POLICING ACADEMY IN RACISM ROW

‘No institutional racism here’ says institution – case closed…

NO REFUNDS!

Council holds onto cash thanks to major problems with new ‘cost cutting’ system

UPDATE: “BRISTOLIAN GOT MY MONEY BACK!”

Intervention by The Bristolian wins young mum refund!

B.R.T: AN OMNIBUS SHAMBLES

Bridge row as transport scheme fiasco trundles on – George’s Stalingrad?

HORSEWORLD BOSS RIDES CHARITY INTO THE GROUND

Rehoming centre heading for knacker’s yard?

TROUGH OVERSEAS AGAIN!

Mayor’s expensive Euro jaunt habit exposed

Plus: May Gurney recycling contract blackmail; Bristol Pound celebrates Mayor’s salary; local councillor annoyed that expenses won’t cover his girlfriend; Council lies over number of gagging orders; and more from Gus Hoyty-Toyty’s Cabinet Diary.

All in your super, soaraway monthly muckraker The Bristolian!

See the Distribution page for where to get your copy…