The past presidents' letter explains comprehensively that the lay leadership was certainly not apathetic even though their efforts failed to achieve a Leeds Jewish high school.

But what their letter does reveal is that throughout all their endeavours they lacked sufficient political leverage locally and nationally to use with the politicians to obtain a Jewish high school.

And this is where Rabbi Kleiman reveals his naivety in not perceiving the extent of the adverse political force the lay leadership faced.

But there was a time when the political scenario was more favourable.

To explain, that time was 1954 when the Talmud Torah school was in Cowper Street and in that year a serious incident occurred in the running of the Talmud Torah which resulted in all the executive officers resigning.

Immediately a new executive arose drawn from business and the professions.

And because the executive were involved with education they sought the advice of a number of highly respected local Jewish headmasters who were then co-opted on to the Talmud Torah Council.

The Council was further augmented by delegates from Leeds Synagogues and I was appointed a delegate representing the New Central Synagogue and attended Talmud Torah meetings.

At a particular meeting the only item on the agenda was the approval of architects' drawings for the new Talmud Torah building to be built at Sandhill Lane.

The meeting listened to the executives' representations on the drawings after which the headmasters enquired about the size of the classrooms.

The reply given to the meeting evoked an immediate response from the headmasters, stating that the size of the classrooms did not conform to the then Education Act.

The headmasters then pointed out that if the size of the classrooms was made to comply with the sizes required by the Education Act then the Talmud Torah could become a state-funded school within the parameters of the control the state required (this is precisely the position with state- funded Jewish schools today).

In the political climate at that time (which later became much more complex), the headmasters, being immersed in the Education Act, were confident that the prescribed size of the classrooms in the case of the Talmud Torah was the leverage needed to obtain state funding.

In the event, the executive officers declined to accept the advice of the headmasters and refused to bring the size of classrooms into conformity with the Education Act.

The upshot was that the headmasters resigned from the Talmud Torah Council.

Their vision was that the Talmud Torah become a state-funded Jewish school occupying the new building in Sandhill Lane and would thereafter develop in the foreseeable future from a junior school to a high school, not necessarily in that order.

And so 54 years ago an opportunity was lost which would have been the start of state-funded Jewish education in Leeds.

Reflecting on these years, all the executive officers were men of integrity who served the community well in many areas in their voluntary work.

It seems they subscribed to the perceived wisdom of that time that Jewish children should integrate with the local populace for their schooling. A vestige of this attitude still persists today.

On this occasion the executive officers lacked the vision needed for the future as demonstrated by the headmasters, and so Leeds remains deprived of a Jewish high school.

Julian M Grant,
34 Sandmoor Lane,
Leeds.