Pupil Roll Numbers and School Closures: London

(Limited Text - Ministerial Extracts only)

Wednesday 7th June 2023 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Schools (Nick Gibb)]

It is a pleasure to participate in yet another debate that you are chairing, Mr Hollobone. I congratulate the hon. Member for Vauxhall (Florence Eshalomi) on securing a debate on this important subject, and for opening it so clearly.

I am aware of the recent report by London Councils on managing surplus places, which highlights the key challenges facing London boroughs. Since the baby boom at the turn of the millennium, we have seen substantial growth in pupil numbers. The Government responded to that by supporting the creation of almost 1.2 million new school places since 2010. In addition to our investment in the free schools programme, the Government have committed over £14 billion of capital grant funding to support local authorities in building new mainstream school places between 2011 and 2026. It is the largest investment in school capacity in at least two generations, and includes £3.5 billion for London alone.

I can recall many debates on the “Today” programme with my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds), back when he represented the Local Government Association, about whether there were enough school places in London; it was almost an annual event for us—and here we are today. As we have seen, population trends do change. In London, the number of young people is falling faster than elsewhere. This is for several reasons, including decreasing birth rates, changes in international migration patterns since the UK’s exit from the EU, and more families relocating outside of London since the pandemic, as my hon. Friend explained so well.

The Government recognise the crucial role that local authorities play in planning local services for their community and championing the interests of children. Local authorities are legally responsible for ensuring that there are enough school places in their area. It is for local authorities, working with academy trusts and other local partners, to balance the supply and demand of school places in line with changing demographics. They have done so for many years. The uncertainty regarding future demographic changes means it is even more prudent for local authorities to remain flexible.

[Ruth Cadbury]

I am grateful for the Minister’s remarks about the role of local authorities. Will he admit that the free schools programme over the last 10 or so years made it very difficult for local authorities to plan school numbers? Back then, during a time of growth, we desperately needed a mixed, non-faith school between Chiswick and Hounslow for the whole of the Isleworth and Brentford area, yet the resources were taken by a free faith school, and a large proportion of its catchment came from a long distance away. Had the local authority been able to broker that decision, we might have had a more locally approached solution. Now we have declining numbers, and I am raising the contrary issue.

[Nick Gibb]

I understand the point the hon. Member is making, but free schools have been crucial in raising standards in our school system. The issue was not just numbers, but what we could do to deliver standards. I can think of a school in the constituency of the hon. Member for Ealing, Southall (Mr Sharma) that opened in 2018 and was in January judged as outstanding. These are important factors to take into account. This is about quality as well as numbers.

Some spare capacity should be retained in the system to manage shifting demand, provide for parental choice and support the effective management of the admissions system. Local factors should be carefully assessed, along with considerations of quality, diversity and accessibility of local provision, and the forecast demand for places, in determining the most appropriate approach in each area. Local authorities are well placed to do that. They have seen periods of decline, bulges and shifts in local patterns before, and have shown they are adept at managing them.

The Department expects local authorities to work collaboratively with their partners to ensure that they are managing the local school estate efficiently and reducing or re-purposing high levels of spare capacity, to avoid undermining the educational offer or financial viability of schools in their area. I know that local authorities, together with trusts, are already considering a range of options for the reutilisation of space. That includes, for example, co-locating nursery provision, as well as options for reconfiguration, including via remodelling, amalgamations and closures where this is the best course of action. Lambeth has rightly been proactive in addressing this issue and is consulting on reducing the capacity of eight primary schools.

The Department continues to engage with local authorities on a regular basis to discuss their plans and potential solutions. One solution is the support and benefits obtained from being part of a strong and established multi-academy trust. The Department believes that all schools should be in strong families of schools, benefiting from the resilience that that brings and the support of the best in the group. That is why, over time, the Department would like all schools to be in a strong multi-academy trusts. By centralising operational and administrative functions, schools within a MAT can save time and money, which can be reinvested directly into areas that have the greatest impact.

The hon. Member for Vauxhall referred to housing issues, as did a number of other Members, including the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury), who has just intervened. The provision of affordable housing is part of the Government’s plan to build more homes and provide aspiring homeowners with a step on to the housing ladder. Our £11.5 billion affordable homes programme will deliver thousands of affordable homes for both rent and to buy across the country. For London, £4 billion has been allocated, to deliver much-needed affordable and social housing in the capital. Since 2010, we have delivered over 632,000 new affordable homes, including over 440,000 affordable homes for rent, of which over 162,000 are for social rent. In fact, more than a fifth of overall delivery between April 2010 and March 2022 was in London, with over 89,000 homes for rent.

[Bell Ribeiro-Addy]

Can the Minister please outline how he defines “affordable” and why, if the homes are “affordable”, so many of my constituents find themselves unable to afford them?

[Nick Gibb]

That question is for another debate, I suspect, especially as I have only six minutes left; I would love to debate that issue with the hon. Member on another occasion. However, we are absolutely aware of the concern and the problem, which is why we are investing, as I said, £4 billion in affordable housing in London alone.

Although the challenge facing mainstream schools is evident, it is important to recognise that there is still a need to increase the supply of places, particularly for children with special educational needs and disabilities—a point made by the hon. Members for Richmond Park (Sarah Olney) and for Strangford (Jim Shannon) during this debate.

The number of children with SEND continues to increase in London, providing local authorities with an opportunity to think creatively about how to organise and structure high-needs provision alongside or within mainstream schools. Some £400 million of the £2 billion in additional funding for schools announced in the autumn statement will go to local authorities’ high-needs budgets and we are investing £2.6 billion in capital funding between 2022 and 2025 to help to deliver new school places for children with special educational needs.

Across London boroughs, councils will work with schools and the wider community to find alternative solutions to closure wherever possible. However, the school estate needs to be managed efficiently, which sometimes means reducing or repurposing high levels of spare capacity, including through closure, where places are not needed in the long term.

I know that the hon. Member for Vauxhall is particularly concerned about two schools in Lambeth that are in different stages on the path to closure: Archbishop Tenison’s School and St Martin-in-the-Fields High School for Girls. Both have a rich history going back hundreds of years. Their trustees explored all the options available and came to the difficult decision to seek a closure, through mutual consent with the Department. I understand how troubling that will be for pupils and their families. School closures are always a last resort. When a school closure is proposed, the regional director will work in consultation with the local authority and trust to gather information and assess the options, with the Secretary of State taking the final decision on the closure of academies. Minimising disruption for children at these schools will always be the Department’s top priority.

The hon. Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson) raised the important point about empty places when pupil numbers fall and the impact that has on school budgets. To support local authorities to meet their sufficiency duty, the Department for Education provides them with revenue funding for growth and falling rolls, through the dedicated school grant. From 2024-25, the Government will additionally give local authorities more flexibilities to support schools seeing a significant decline in pupil numbers, where these places will still be needed within the next three to five years. Local authorities will be able to use their growth and falling rolls funding allocations to meet the revenue costs of repurposing school places.

My hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner requested a ban on academy trusts disposing of school land. Land and buildings are in fact held in trust, and the most common result of a closure is for the land and building to revert back either to the local authority or to the diocese if it was a Church school.

The hon. Member for Eltham (Clive Efford) raised Avery Hill, which I would be very happy to discuss with him. The free schools programme has been pivotal in meeting the demand for places since 2010, and has provided thousands of good new places across the country. In 2022, pupils in primary and secondary free schools made more progress on average than pupils in other schools. I have already referred to the outstanding free school in Ealing, the Ada Lovelace Church of England High School, which recently received a very good Ofsted report.

The performance of schools within the Harris Federation is even more impressive. Harris is one of the strongest and most successful multi-academy trusts. It educates more than 40,000 children in 52 schools across London, and 98% of its schools have been judged either good or outstanding by Ofsted. The Department continuously reviews the viability of all schools in the free schools pipeline, and we are looking closely at all the arguments for and against the free school at Avery Hill. We will open the school only when we are confident that it will be good, viable, sustainable and successful.

I am proud of the work that the Government have done since 2010 to ensure that we have school places where and when they are needed. As population trends change in London and across the country, we will keep supporting local authorities and trusts to ensure that any changes to local schools come with minimal disruption to our children and young people.

--- Later in debate ---

[Florence Eshalomi]

I am happy to end the debate now. I thank the Minister. I note that he has not answered any of my questions, so will he meet me?

[Nick Gibb]

indicated assent.

[Mr Philip Hollobone (in the Chair)]

Order. I believe that there are two votes, so the sitting will be resumed at 4.27 pm. I am ending the debate without the question being put.