Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what discussions his Department has had with Birmingham City Council on increasing the number of (a) primary and (b) secondary school places in Sutton Coldfield constituency.

Supporting local authorities to create sufficient school places is one of the government’s top priorities. Local authorities are responsible for providing enough school places for children in their area. Birmingham was allocated £23,208,348 of basic need funding earlier this year for places needed by September 2023.

Officials are in close liaison with Birmingham City Council and all other local authorities with regard to the sufficiency of local school provision. The department engages regularly to discuss local intelligence and offer advice and support to ensure sufficiency requirements are addressed.

In Birmingham, at a citywide level, a reduction in demand at primary phase is expected and, as a consequence, the department does not anticipate any local expansion plans in the primary phase in the short term. In contrast, during recent engagement with Birmingham City Council, it was identified that the local authority plans to uplift secondary phase capacity in Sutton Coldfield. We anticipate further engagement with Birmingham City Council about the detail of these expansion plans.