Court battle to stop deaf school closure

Parents are mounting a legal challenge to the planned closure of a Paisley nursery school that specialises in the integration of hearing-impaired nursery children. Sara Craig, whose deaf three-year-old son attends Gateside School, said Renfrewshire Council had not consulted fully or adequately on its proposals to close Gateside, which currently caters for 17 children, of whom three are deaf. The school is also the base for a peripatetic service for deaf children which is to be amalgamated into other peripatetic services for children with special educational needs. It was originally intended to cater for 15 children with hearing impairments.