Secondary Schooling (Sevenoaks)

Nick Gibb Excerpts

Thursday 9th September 2010 Commons Chamber

[The Minister of State, Department for Education (Mr Nick Gibb)]

I start by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Michael Fallon) on securing the debate. As a former Education Minister, he has a passion for raising standards in our schools and ensuring that good schools have the autonomy and professional freedoms to deliver high-quality education. He was himself instrumental in the reforms that led to local management of schools: a seminal educational reform that has resulted in huge benefits to schools—I hesitate to say this—over the past 20 years. It is the coalition Government’s ambition to raise academic standards in our schools, particularly for children from poorer backgrounds. Education is the main route to social mobility, and closing the attainment gap between those from the wealthiest and poorest backgrounds is a key objective of this Government.

The Academies Act 2010 will enable us to expand the academies programme, and 100 new academies have opened over the past two weeks. It will also enable primary and special schools to become academies and enjoy the freedoms that that status brings. My hon. Friend is right to pay tribute to the Knole academy, which is one of the new academies that has opened this week. We are currently examining the national curriculum, with a view to restoring it to its original purpose—a core entitlement built around subject disciplines—and we are empowering parents, teachers and other educational institutions to establish free schools so that parents have a genuine choice for their children.

School buildings need continuing investment, of course, but it is vital that future spending represents the best possible value for the taxpayer. Building Schools for the Future was a flagship programme of the previous Government, set up for the purpose of rebuilding or refurbishing every secondary school in the country by 2023. Indeed, some impressive new buildings have been built, and it must be true that a good working environment can only help academic achievement and improve behaviour. However, the BSF programme was not the most cost-effective way to deliver new school buildings. Rebuilding a school under BSF was three times more expensive than constructing a commercial building and twice as expensive as building a school in Ireland.

During the five years of the BSF programme, out of 3,500 secondary schools just 211 benefited and only 112 were completely rebuilt. The budget rose from £45 billion to £55 billion for a variety of reasons, and the time scale of the programme from 10 years to 18 years. Of the £250 million spent before building began, £60 million was spent on consultants or advisory fees. In effect, BSF became hugely bureaucratic, with process within process and cost upon cost, and it represented poor value for money.

Nobody comes into politics to cut public spending, but the Government are faced with a £156 billion deficit, the largest among the G20 countries. It is our responsibility, difficult though it may be, to sort out the mess that we have inherited. Failure to do so, as my hon. Friend knows, would put our economic recovery in jeopardy. Although we have announced that the BSF programme will end, that does not mean the end of capital spending on schools.

I know that my hon. Friend is a tireless advocate for educational excellence in his constituency, and that he has invested a great deal of energy in the future funding of the Knole academy. As he said, the academy, which opened this month, was formed by the merger of the Bradbourne school and the Wildernesse school. It is sponsored by Gordon Phillips, chairman of the Glen Care Group, and co-sponsored by Sevenoaks school and Kent county council. It specialises in languages, and everyone is optimistic that it will increase opportunities for young people in the Sevenoaks area. I add my thanks to those of my hon. Friend to all those who have put in so much work to deliver the opening of the academy on time this September.

As my hon. Friend said, the academy is based in the existing premises of Bradbourne and Wildernesse, which means that it is currently operating on a split site. I know from experience in my own constituency that that is far from a satisfactory arrangement, with teachers and pupils having to travel between the two sites. In my constituency there is far less than a mile between the two sites, and I know how inconvenient that is. If the distance is as much as a mile in the Sevenoaks case, it must be hugely inconvenient and time-consuming.

As my hon. Friend said, the proposed new school building would be based on just one of the sites, the Wildernesse site, and it was hoped that it would be ready by 2012-13. I share his belief in the importance of high-quality school buildings, because although it is undoubtedly true that a school’s primary assets are its teaching and support staff and its educational ethos, it is equally true that it is vital to give children and teachers a well-maintained working environment.

The natural depredations of the climate, and the wear and tear suffered by any building that is used by hundreds of people on a daily basis, mean constant investment in our school infrastructure, so I am extremely sympathetic to my hon. Friend, and indeed to all hon. Members who have schools in their constituencies that are in need of rebuilding or repair, but the inefficiency of the BSF structure and the parlous state of the public finances meant that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State friend had no choice but to suspend the programme and announce an urgent review of schools capital spending.

In determining which projects would go ahead and which would cease, the Government developed a single set of criteria and applied it nationally. Projects that would continue would be those that were part of their area’s initial BSF schemes and that had reached financial close; the so-called sample projects that were part of their area’s initial BSF schemes where financial close had not been reached but where a preferred bidder had been appointed at close of dialogue; and some planned school projects in addition to a local authority’s initial scheme that had outline business cases approved before 1 January.

As part of the BSF announcement, the planned new build for the Knole academy was put on hold pending completion of the capital review. The Knole project was in the feasibility stage at the time that it was paused, and an outline business case had not at that point been approved. As my hon. Friend knows, capital builds were put on hold for five academies in Kent other than the Knole academy. However, capital was allocated for two: the Isle of Sheppey academy and the Skinners’ academy.

The Secretary of State announced a complete review of how capital will be allocated and spent in improving the fabric of school buildings. The review, which is now under way and led by Sebastian James, will look at how best to meet parental demand, make design and procurement cost-effective and efficient, and overhaul the allocation and targeting of capital. Over the next few months, officials will work with all 75 projects that are for decision after the spending review to discuss their capital needs. Those discussions will focus on the most appropriate and cost-effective way to deliver the sponsors’ educational vision. In the case of the Knole Academy, that will include a site visit involving partnerships for schools, the Department for Education and the Young People’s Learning Agency, as well as Kent county council and the academy trust.

We hope to be able to make final decisions on capital allocations towards the latter part of this year. I assure my hon. Friend that the Department will continue to make capital allocations on the basis of need, and in particular on the basis of the level of a building’s dilapidation and deprivation, and that his representations today and in recent weeks will be taken seriously by the capital review team. However, as I am sure he understands, I am unable to make any commitments today or until the review has completed its work.

In conclusion, I pay tribute to my hon. Friend’s energy and tireless work in promoting the case for the rebuilding of the Knole academy. He makes a compelling case on behalf of his constituents, which I have taken on board. I hope that in some measure he will be reassured by my promise that all future decisions on capital spending will be made in a transparent, straightforward and above all fair way, which puts the needs of children and parents first. In today’s economic climate, we have a duty to ensure that we continue to invest where investment is needed, to get the best possible value for taxpayers’ money, and to achieve a right balance between spending and other means of school improvement.

Change will not be delivered by spending decisions alone. It will be delivered by creating a system that places more trust in the professionals working within it. The Government believe that head teachers should have more control over how money is spent, that teachers should have more autonomy over how they teach their students, and that parents should have a real choice on which school they send their child to. Future spending must support those aims and ensure that money is directed at those who need it most.

Question put and agreed to.