Education Business

£418.3 million has been announced to be invested in six local authorities who are set to join the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme.

The six areas of Buckinghamshire, Cornwall, Gateshead, Lincolnshire, Oxfordshire and Sutton can now start planning in detail to fast-track their most urgent building projects or deprived areas, far earlier than originally planned - with capital investment released from 2012-13.

The rest of each area's schools will be rebuilt or refurbished with the vast majority of local authorities due to finish their full BSF programmes by 2020 and the remaining projects in the closing stages.

Partnerships for Schools assessed all proposals to make sure their long-term plans were sturdy and will transform education standards across their areas.

24 projects have received approval this financial year, including 20 local authorities new to BSF and the number of open BSF schools more than trebling since the end of 2008 to 149.

Overall, 101 local authorities are now in BSF and 50 have now reached financial close on their projects, with 1000 schools in the pipeline and by next year at least 200 schools benefiting from BSF investment will be opening annually.
 
Children’s Secretary Ed Balls said: "BSF is the most ambitious public building programme for decades. This is outstanding news for these areas – meaning that pupils, teachers, parents and communities will reap the benefits of high-quality facilities for decades to come."

"The first half of BSF rightly targeted areas with the highest level of need but this announcement gives these six areas the scope to target pockets of deprivation or underperforming schools sooner than was previously possible."

Further information
DCSF