£2.4 million investment to create extra school places
Education secretary Justine Greening has detailed how £2.4 million will be spent on improving school buildings and creating extra pupil places.
Although not new money, Greening explained which areas will receive funding.
The funding comprises £980 million for local authorities in 2019 to 2020, to create over 60,000 school places needed. This is part of a wider investment of £7 billion, alongside an investment in the free schools programme, which is expected to create an additional 600,000 places by 2021.
The funding also comprises £1.4 billion of funding allocations for schools, local authorities and academy trusts to invest in improving the condition of the school estate. This includes £466 million through the Condition Improvement Fund to fund 1,435 projects across 1,184 academies and sixth-form colleges.
The announcement follows new government figures which show that almost 735,000 additional school places have been created since 2010.
This is with 92 per cent of new primary places and 89 per cent of new secondary places created in schools rated as ‘good’ or ‘outstanding’ by Ofsted in 2015 to 2016.
Local councils say they need to create more than 230,000 primary and secondary school places between now and 2020. This funding will help the government get closer to achieving their aim of creating over 600,000 extra places by 2021 to meet local demand.
As part of its Plan for Britain, the government wants every child to have access to a ‘good’ school place, giving them the skills and knowledge they need to succeed in the future.
Greening said: “Our Plan for Britain is to build a fairer society, with a good school place available for every child.
“This £2.4 billion investment, together with our proposals to create more good school places, will help ensure every young person has the opportunity to fulfil their potential.
The £2.4 billion allocated today is part of more than £24 billion the government has committed to investing in the school estate between 2015 to 2021.
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