05.06.18
Hinds pledges £730m to create new school places
Councils are set to receive £730m to fund new school places, education secretary Damian Hinds has announced.
Included in this is £630m of basic needs allocations to create the places needed by September 2021.
The plans form part of the government’s £7bn investment from 2015 to 2021 to create new school places, and part of a wider plan to invest more than £23bn in the school estate by 2021.
Hinds explained: "Announcing these allocations means local authorities can plan ahead with confidence, and make good strategic investment decisions to ensure they deliver good school places for every child who needs one.”
The government recently published its 2017 School Capacity Survey, revealing that 825,000 additional school places had been created since 2010, with 90,000 delivered in 2016-17 alone.
According to Hinds, the majority of these places have been created in good or outstanding schools, with 91% of the new places added between 2016 and 2017 in both primary and secondary phases created in schools rated as good or outstanding by Ofsted.
The education secretary said: “The government are also committed to investing in school places for children with special educational needs and disabilities.
“As part of this, I am announcing a further £50m top-up to the special provision capital fund to take our total investment to £265m across 2018-21.
“This additional funding will help local authorities to create further school places and facilities for pupils with special educational needs and disabilities.”
In addition, Hinds announced £50m of basic need funding to contribute towards the capital costs of building a new mainstream secondary presumption free school in a targeted number of local authorities.
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