It is welcome news that Kingston will be given £13m to help ease our schools places crisis over the next three years, as reported in your article.

It is a pity, though, that Conservative MP Zac Goldsmith has used this good news to engage in political point scoring.

His comments that, “the last government ignored the fact that rising birth rates meant we will need thousands more school places in the coming years, and did little to prepare," is factually wrong and another example of the Tories trying to revise history for their own political purposes.

The Surrey Comet reported on 2nd November 2009, in an article titled "Kingston Council bumped up Building School for the Future list", that Kingston was prioritised under Labour's Building Schools for the Future Programme and was due to receive the funding needed to create the required extra school places plus updates to existing schools.

Labour's successful Building Schools for the Future programme was scrapped by Conservative Education Secretary Michael Gove in 2010, hence the delay in funding for extra school places in Kingston and the current crisis.

Zac Goldsmith should apologise on behalf of the Tories for this delay rather than try to smear others with his misinformation.

Lee Godfrey; Labour's Parliamentary Candidate for Kingston and Surbiton

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