A row has broken out over the number of Bradford parents who appeal against their children's failure to go to the secondary school of their choice.

Department of Education figures show parents in Bradford have lodged the highest number of appeals in the Yorkshire and Humberside region.

The DofE reckons that out of 11,600 admissions to secondary schools in 1996-97, 1,278 appeals were lodged. This puts it at the top of the appeals table, outnumbering those lodged by tens of thousands of other parents across Yorkshire and Humberside.

But Bradford's education department rejected the findings, insisting Government sums painted the wrong picture, failing to take into account the district's three tier system.

The Government research comes as it prepares to announce a fairer system, in which appeals panels would be independent of Local Education Authorities.

In their round-up, Bradford fares badly in the secondary school stakes and the primary sector.

In 1996-97, 394 parents disagreed with a decision not to admit their child to a primary school out of an overall 6,148 admissions - second in the region after Leeds.

Some 73 per cent actually went to appeal and just under half won a decision in their favour.

In appeals for secondary schools allocation, 80 per cent got as far as the panel and 36 per cent had an appeal determined in their favour.

A spokesman for Bradford's education department said the Government had simply got its sums wrong and the comparison was not a fair one.

He said: "The Government figures include those for voluntary-aided Roman Catholic and Church of England schools who are responsible for their own admissions.

"They also do not compare like with like because we currently have a three tier system."

He said the Government had counted middle schools in Bradford as secondary schools, inflating the number of admissions to secondary schools.

Bradford claims a more just reflection of the situation would be to say just 344 appeals against primary school allocations were lodged, of which 258 were heard.

Equally, according to city hall, only 913 appeals were lodged over secondary places, of which 682 were heard.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.