PLEASE reconsider the closure of The Wilderness and Plump Hill Centres. Although the county council claims to want to provide outdoor education it has decided to sell the sites rather than allow them to be set up as charitable trusts which would mean that there could be provision without the council needing to provide the service.

It seems horribly shortsighted to make the first solution the sale of the sites for development rather than as potential outdoor education businesses.

The benefit to children is obvious to anyone who has been involved with the centres; those whose children have attended, teachers who take groups of children to aid the curriculum and the staff who teach at the Centres.

The Wilderness and Plump Hill Centres are unique in a different way. They provide environmental as well as outdoor education.

The knowledge of the environment gained at the two sites of animal and plant diversity and habitat and the effect humans have on them is invaluable.

The pupils are adults of the future who will have challenging decisions to make regarding the environment.

This is not to mention the actual wildlife itself that has been protected for nearly half a century.

I know that the centres are thriving and are full all year round; schools attend year after year for the high quality teaching by teacher-led staff.

Please reconsider the sale of these sites for vacant possession. Please try to sell them as going concerns, at least in the first instance to give the parties concerned time to organise purchase by a trust that can take them over.

Thank you.

Dana Chambers

Pope's Hill