THE news that Ilkley Grammar School has failed in its bid to secure funding from the Priority School Building Programme should come as no surprise. In the whole of West Yorkshire, which has a population of more than 2.2 million people, only five schools were given any government money. Meanwhile, leafy Surrey and Home Counties Hertfordshire, each with half the population of West Yorkshire, managed to gain funding for 16 and 15 schools respectively.

Ilkley Grammar School lost out when the present government cancelled the Building Schools for the Future scheme in July 2010. Conservative MP Kris Hopkins claims in the intervening four and a half years he has been a “vocal advocate” of increased investment in IGS. But, sadly for the pupils and staff who have to suffer the school’s inadequate facilities, his vocal advocacy seems to have fallen on deaf ears.

Edward Wild

Alexandra Crescent, Ilkley