A CAMPAIGN to provide deaf children with specialist schooling is going to the top.

Parents are lodging an appeal with Education Secretary David Blunkett against plans by Middlesbrough Borough Council to transfer deaf youngsters from the town's Beverley School for the deaf to mainstream schools.

The council intends turning their present school into a centre for autistic youngsters, numbers of whom, it says, are rising, while the number of deaf children attending is dropping.

Lesley Turner, secretary of the parents' action group, revealed plans yesterday to protest to Mr Blunkett about the proposal, which is expected to be rubber-stamped early next year by the Schools Organisation Committee.

It is chaired by Councillor Geoff Connolly, education commissioner with Middlesbrough council. Both Coun Connolly and the local authority want integration in mainstream schools.

An appeal by parents for a dedicated unit to replace Beverley School made no impression at Middlesbrough council's cabinet this week.

Mrs Turner said parents had no choice but to file an objection, which will force the Department of Education to intervene.

She said: "We need to keep specialist provision for the region, because there is nothing else after Beverley School. Deaf kids need other deaf kids to sign (language), to communicate, to know what is going on.

"They do not interact with hearing children. If there are only three deaf kids in a room full of hearing people and two of them are off school, poorly, the child left is going to be, and feel, isolated. At the moment that does not happen.''

Mrs Turner added: "They do not know what the kids need, because they have not asked. If you do not ask questions, you cannot establish needs. We are asking the council questions and not getting any answers.''

The council claims that, far from the move being a cost-cutting exercise, it proposes spending £750,000 to secure the expertise of staff and provide coordinated and flexible provision.