Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, with reference to her Department's press release entitled £740 million allocated for 10,000 new places for pupils with SEND, published on 27 March 2025, how many of those places will be in schools in Bedfordshire.

The statutory duty to provide sufficient school places for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) or who require alternative provision sits with local authorities.

The department has now published allocations for £740 million in High Needs Provision Capital Allocations (HNPCA) for the 2025/26 financial year, to support local authorities to deliver new places in mainstream and special schools, as well as other specialist settings, and to improve the suitability and accessibility of existing buildings.

The funding can be used to adapt schools to be more accessible for children with SEND, to create specialist facilities within mainstream schools that can deliver more intensive support adapted to suit the pupils’ needs and to create special school places for pupils with the most complex needs.

Central Bedfordshire Council has been allocated £4.4 million for 2025/26 and it is up to the local authority to make decisions about the places they create and to prioritise this funding to meet local needs.

School buildings are integral to high and rising standards and need to be fit for the future. The department therefore also supports local authorities, academy trusts and voluntary-aided school bodies, which are responsible for keeping buildings safe and well-maintained by providing, capital funding, delivering major rebuilding programmes and offering guidance and support.

The department is increasing capital funding to improve the condition of school buildings to £2.1 billion for the 2025/26 financial year, up from £1.8 billion for the 2024/25 financial year.

As part of this, for the 2025/26 financial year, Central Bedfordshire Council has been provisionally allocated a school condition allocation (SCA) of £3.3 million to decide how to allocate across its maintained schools based on local knowledge of condition need, prioritising keeping schools safe and operational. Local authority schools in Central Bedfordshire have also been provisionally allocated a total of £0.4 million in devolved formula capital (DFC) in 2025/26 to spend on their own capital priorities.

Large multi-academy trusts and large voluntary aided school bodies, such as dioceses, will also have been provisionally allocated SCA, but allocations typically span across local authority boundaries. Smaller multi-academy and single academy trusts and sixth form colleges were instead eligible to apply to the Condition Improvement Fund, with outcomes due to be published later in the spring. All eligible non-maintained schools in Bedfordshire have also been provisionally allocated DFC.

Provisional capital condition allocations for 2025/26 are published on GOV.UK, with final allocations to follow later in the spring.