Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate her Department has made of which secondary planning areas will have a ratio of pupil numbers forecast to estimated capacity of (a) greater than one, (b) one, (c) at or above 0.97 and below one and (d) at or above 0.95 and below 0.97 for the 2025-26 academic year; and what steps she (i) has taken and (ii) plans to take to increase capacity in each area.

Information on school place planning estimates for the 2025/26 academic year, including pupil forecasts and estimated capacity, are published at planning area level in the annual School Capacity statistics publication. This can be accessed here: https://explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk/find-statistics/school-capacity.

The statutory duty to provide sufficient school places sits with local authorities. The department provides capital funding through the Basic Need grant to support local authorities to provide school places, based on their own pupil forecasts and school capacity data. We have already announced allocations up to 2025/26, for places needed by September 2026. Allocations can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/basic-need-allocations.