TEACHERS at a Canvey school are furious about a Labour Party election leaflet which featured a picture of the school and suggested standards were falling.

The image of Cornelius Vermuyden School features on the front page of a leaflet above a headline which reads “lower standards in the name of profit”.

The party claims the slogan is referring to Essex County Council’s plans to contract out all of its services to private companies.

But headteacher Carol Skewes said it was misleading. She said: “We are all very upset about it. Standards have not dropped, they have actually improved.

“Last year the school gained the best GCSE A* to C results, with many pupils achieving ten or more A*/As at GCSE.”

Last year 34 per cent of students achieved five GCSEs, including maths and English, at grade A* to C. This compares to a national average of 47.9 per cent and was higher than Furtherwick Park School which achieved 24 per cent, but slightly less then Castle View which achieved 38 per cent.

In 2006 Ofsted inspectors said the school offered an “outstanding level of care, guidance and support to its students” and praised extra curricular activities.

It has been chosen for a multi-million pound partial rebuild as part of the Government’s Building Schools for the Future project.

Mrs Skewes said: “We oppose the school photograph used in this way to promote political support; as a school we are politically neutral.”

The newsletter encourages people to vote for Labour in the Essex County Council and European Elections on Thursday.

Brian Wilson, Castle Point Council’s only Labour councillor, who is acting as an agent for the county candidates, said: “Castle Point Labour Party would like to make it clear that the headline ‘lower standards in the name of profit,” referred to the Conservative County Council’s published plans to privatise the council’s services. There was certainly no slur intended on the school.”