The Education and Manpower Bureau is fighting the first in a wave of judicial review applications opposing its controversial move to close under-enrolled schools. The bureau yesterday sought to quash the May 4 decision by Madam Justice Carlye Chu Fun-ling to grant Madam Lam Yuet-mei leave to apply for a judicial review over the decision not to provide funding for the Kin Tak Public School at Sheung Shui village. The school was thrown into the limelight in January when its principal, Fong Hong-kwong, staged a hunger strike in opposition to the closure. This year has seen a flurry of judicial review applications by schools fighting moves by the bureau to axe Primary One classes if there are less than 23 enrolments. The bureau yesterday told the court that there was no reason to give money to a school where parents did not want to enrol their children. The court also heard the application was confusing as Madam Lam had included the bureau's separate decision in 2002 not to include the school on the roster for the allocation of Primary One pupils. It was also argued that the application for a judicial review was filed too late because it was made more than three months after the bureau's decision. The court was told that even though Madam Lam had filed the writ, the school was behind her. Madam Justice Chu, sitting in the Court of First Instance, reserved her decision, which will be handed down at a later date. The Education and Manpower Bureau has barred 31 schools from operating classes because they failed to enrol 23 first-year pupils. Seven have since merged classes and one merged with a private school.
