St Christopher’s School in Westbury Park up for sale again

A former special needs school which closed in an abuse scandal five years ago has been put up for sale, after the firm which bought it to develop it went into administration.

The site of St Christopher’s School in Westbury Park, which includes the Grade II-listed Grace House, is on the market and could be sold for millions of pounds after the receivers were called in to take over the company that owns the site.

The firm bought the school the year after it closed in 2019, and then put forward controversial plans to turn the school and its grounds into a new retirement and care home village. But a coalition of local residents and parents calling for the site to continue to be used as a special needs school battled the plans, and councillors unanimously rejected the scheme in August 2023.

The campaign group SCAN - St Christopher’s Action Network - persuaded the city council to register the site as an ‘Asset of Community Value’ in February this year, which means they or another community group are entitled to be notified when it’s put up for sale, and have six months to come up with the money to buy it.

While the school is not yet being publicly marketed, SCAN says it has received a notification that it’s now up for sale, triggering the six-month window. Documents at Companies House show the company set up to redevelop the site called in the receivers in October, and it will be them who have put the site up for sale. When it was sold back in 2020, it was bought for £10 million.

The five-acre site in Westbury Park consists of five Victorian Villas which used to house the students, as well as the Grade II-listed Grace House, built in the 1960s according to unique Steiner principles – all set in a green landscape which used to be orchards.

The building's owners do have property guardians living on site, but a spokesperson for SCAN, Robin Hambleton, said the group were worried that the building and the grounds could be falling into disrepair, and they welcome the sale. “Ever since the previous plans for a ludicrously sized luxury retirement complex were unanimously thrown out by the council, the community has been waiting to find what happens next for this precious site,” he said.

“Now it’s been declared as an Asset of Community Value, we hope that anyone interested in the former school, puts the local community and the site’s SEND legacy at the heart of any plans. We are concerned the site is not currently being looked after as it should be – the once-beautiful gardens are now severely overgrown with buildings covered in ivy. We really want this unique asset to be brought back to life for the community,” he added.

“We are looking forward to seeing who is interested in buying the site and hope to work with them so they can bring tangible benefits, honour the site’s SEND legacy, respect the environment and not undermine the existing local infrastructure,” he added.

Bristol Live first broke the scandal at St Christopher’s School back in July 2019, when the school and residential care home suddenly closed following allegations of child cruelty. The original special needs school, which was run by a company called Aurora, closed amid complaints from Bristol City Council that at least five children there suffered abuse. Police later acknowledged that there was a legal loophole that prevented charges being brought, despite a lengthy investigation. A Channel 4 investigation later confirmed that the family of at least one of the pupils there had received an out-of-court settlement from Aurora.

The school was bought by a group of international investors, who set up a separate company called St Christopher’s Propco Ltd. Two of its four directors resigned last year, a third resigned at the end of October, and two London-based official receivers were appointed at the start of October to handle the sale of the school site.