priority school building programme
Education consultations and the priority school building
programme (PSBP)
16 September 2011
Earlier this year, the government responded to Sebastian James’
review into school procurement. The key points of Education
Secretary Michael Gove’s statement were as follows:
James report recommendations
The government will move “more quickly” on some of the other
James recommendations, including:
developing a suite of standardised designs for school
buildings
- collecting condition data to allow funding to be targeted
- simplification of the school premises regulations
Consultations
Whilst the government wishes to accept “the majority” of the
James report recommendations, this is subject to a new consultation
that will run until 11 October and focus on two key areas:
- the best model for allocating and prioritising capital
- proposals for a more centralised procurement process
The Government is also consulting in relation
to:
- school funding reform. The government propose to introduce a
new national formula so that money is allocated more consistently
across the country; expand the eligibility criteria of the Pupil
Premium; and fund high need pupils and early education
- whether the government should implement the reforms from
2013-14 or wait until a later spending period. The current funding
system will be maintained schools for 2012-13. Details of the
arrangements for funding academies in 2012/13 “will be available in
due course"
- the 16-19 funding formula and methodology.
Funding
An extra £500 million of capital funding will be available this
financial year for more school places in areas “of greatest need” –
especially primary schools.
Of perhaps greatest interest to schools will be a new privately
financed school building programme – (the PSBP) - to focus on
school buildings in greatest need of repair. Between 100 and 300
schools were expected to benefit from “around £2 billion in up
front construction costs”. Local authorities, schools, and other
organisations with responsibility for them have until 14 October to
apply for funding.
There are still a number of questions surrounding these schemes
but, in most cases, they are expected to be centrally procured
“batched” PFI schemes. It also seems likely that existing
standardised documentation will be built upon to deliver these
schemes – particularly given the James review’s recommendations
that capital procurements become more standardised.
The new money attached to the PSPB must be set in the context of
an estimated £30-£40 million school maintenance backlog and
cancellation of many Building Schools for the Future projects.
Nevertheless those local authorities, academies and maintained
schools with education estate in the greatest need will await the
decision of Partnerships for Schools on their applications (and
further details on the form of these procurements) with interest.
PfS has stated that decisions on applications will be made in
December.
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