Three petitions have attracted more than 2,000 signatures from people worried about the future of Merton Adult Education (MAE) - currently the subject of a council review as it seeks to fill a £32m budget gap.

A petition set up by Joseph Hood Primary School, which is next door to the MAE site in Whatley Avenue, Raynes Park, calls for the council to protect the school and its 300 children when making decisions.

The school said it has been alarmed with the speed of the council’s decision making and was distressed it was not consulted when the proposals were first announced.

The school’s petition has 268 signatures, with the Save MAE petition so far clocking 1,079. Lib Dem Parliamentary candidate, Shas Sheehan is also running a petition which has attracted more than 800 signatures.

As well as three petitions, a Twitter campaign @Save_MAE has been launched to save the service which has more than 5,000 students as the council kicks off budget discussions ahead of next year.

Merton Conservatives have called in a decision by the Labour council’s cabinet to review adult education and this will be discussed at a special meeting on Thursday, December 4, by the Sustainable Communities panel.

Wimbledon MP Stephen Hammond organised a public meeting on Wednesday, November 19, for concerned neighbours.

Speaking at the meeting, Mr Hammond said: "There is no reason for the council to take adult education services away from here.

"There is a huge amount of people that benefit from these services.

"This is being rushed through."

There have been rumours of the site either being sold or retained as a secondary school to plug the gap for secondary education in the borough.

When the Wimbledon Guardian put this to the council, Cabinet member for education Councillor Martin Whelton said: "The Whatley Avenue site is used for adult education.

"We are consulting on how we can continue to deliver adult learning in Merton in the face of government cuts to our funding.

"The purpose of this review is to make a decision about how adult learning can be delivered in an affordable way.

"We use over 40 sites to deliver adult learning and some models of delivering the service in the borough may lead to using additional venues but this will be assessed once an affordable model has been decided on."

An online public consultation has since been launched by the council which is due to finish in January.

Posey Furnish, who is the chair of governors at Joseph Hood Primary School said: "Tomorrow we will send out a template letter to parents to write to Stephen Hammond.

"It is being a positive voice  - we are not going to whinge, we are going to say Merton Council, you are not going to ignore us.

"We want a proper consultation.

"We are going to stand up for ourselves."

Two meetings for residents organised by the council have been scheduled for Tuesday, December 2 at 2pm and 7pm at the council chamber in Morden.

Councillor Martin Whelton and director of the community and housing department, Simon Williams, will be on hand to discuss options.

Take part in the survey by visiting the website.