Downing Street Says » PM Speech/Education

The Prime Minister’s Official Spokesman (PMOS) advised journalists that the Prime Minister would be making a speech this afternoon at the new Capital City Academy in Willesden. The key theme was the launch of the Building Schools for the Future initiative through which the Government planned to rebuild or refurbish every secondary school in England over the next fifteen years, as part of a capital spending programme which due to reach £5.1bn 2005. The first wave of the programme would involve fourteen LEAs sharing over £2bn (from the £5.1bn). Each one would be asked to come up with a systematic ‘renewal plan’ to overhaul their school buildings, moving away from the ‘sticking plaster’ approach of the past – fixing of a roof here or a broken window there – to a thorough going review of the size, character and number of schools locality by locality. In the plans, the LEAs would be asked to consider the scope for City Academies above the fifty three we wanted to see by 2007.

“Where the challenge is greatest, the reform must be boldest – and academies embody that principle.

“This will be the greatest school renewal programme in British history, reversing a generation of under-investment in our schools.

“It is made possible by capital spending rising to £5.1bn by 2005 – over seven times the £700m inherited in 1997. This is a massive investment in our nation’s future.”

Asked if the money would be spent on PFI/PPP contracts, the PMOS said that the first wave of the programme would involve fourteen LEAs who would share £2bn of the £5.1bn. Those LEAs would be: Bradford, Bristol, Gateshead and South Tyneside, Knowsley, Leeds, Manchester, Newcastle-Upon-Tyne, Newham, Sheffield, Solihull, Southwark, Greenwich and Lewisham, Stoke-on-Trent, Sunderland and Waltham Forest. Eventually, the programme would be rolled out to every secondary school across England. In the past, repairs to schools had meant patch and repair. The Building Schools for the Future initiative was about systematic renewal, whether rebuilding or refurbishment. Asked if the purpose of the programme was to encourage LEAs to look at PPPs, the PMOS pointed out that City Academies, by their very nature, involved sponsorship as the scheme was all about businesses working with local communities. These were specialist schools. For example, the Capital City Academy in Willesden, which the Prime Minister was visiting today, specialised in sport.

Asked if schools were going to have to bid for the money, the PMOS said no. It was up to the LEAs to come up with a ‘renewal plan’ in which they would need to consider seriously the scope for City Academies which, as was well known, were independently managed. This was investment and reform, hand-in hand. The key point was the focus on the management, governors, teaching and curriculum. They would need to consider not only the size, but the character and number of schools locality by locality. Asked if the money being allocated was new money, the PMOS said no. It was coming out of the Department’s budget which had been allocated in last year’s Budget. Today’s announcement was outlining details about how the money was going to be spent. It was a systematic way of making up for the under-investment of previous years.

Asked if schools could be knocked down and rebuilt under the initiative, the PMOS said that at the moment, the programme was focussing in particular on deprived areas. Eventually, it would be rolled out to every secondary school in England. In order to deliver a personalised education service for each child, we were asking LEAs to provide a proper assessment of whether a school building needed to be replaced or refurbished – in other words, to come up with a building that was new, or as new, and was therefore fit for the next generation. Asked if it was fair to ask schools to wait for the national rollout, the PMOS said that the point of today’s announcement was to underline that LEAs should move away from the ‘mend as you go’ option and examine rationally instead what needed to be done. If a school was in a very bad state, then of course it would be considered in the first wave of the programme if it was one of the fourteen LEA areas. Asked what the school should do if it wasn’t in one of the initial fourteen LEA areas, the PMOS pointed out that this was not the only money being spent on schools. It was part of a plan to rebuild or refurbish every secondary school in England over the next fifteen years, as part of a capital spending programme which due to reach £5.1bn 2005.

Asked if today’s announcement was an indication that the Government’s education policy had slipped, the PMOS said no. He noted that the only reason why this sort of rational, systematic approach was possible was because of the work that had been done in the past. In the same way – and in the light of the recent debate about Government targets – it was only possible to refine the policy down because of the work that had been done before. This applied both to hospitals and schools. People were already recognising that changes were taking place in our public services. What they wanted to know, however, was that the process of change was going to be carried through in a way that delivered to every area. Today’s announcement was a strong indication of the Government’s commitment that that would happen.

Asked if headteachers had been consulted about the Government’s Building Schools for the Future initiative or whether the policy was being imposed on them, the PMOS said that anyone who had seen the reaction of the teachers, pupils and community leaders at Bexley Business Academy last September would recognise that this was what schools, teachers and parents wanted because it provided the location, building, skills and equipment they needed for a personalised education. The purpose of the programme was not only to make up for a lack of investment in the past, but to go beyond that by providing the equipment they needed for the future. That was the important thing.

No Comments »

No comments yet.

RSS feed for comments on this post.

Post a public comment

Name (required)
E-mail (required)
(You must give an email address, but it will not be displayed to the public.)
Website
(You may give your website, and it will be displayed to the public.)

Comments:

This is not a way of contacting the Prime Minister. If you would like to contact the Prime Minister, go to the 10 Downing Street official site.

Privacy note: Shortly after posting, your name and comment will be displayed on the site. This means that people searching for your name on the Internet will be able to find and read your comment.

Original PMOS briefings are © Crown Copyright. Crown Copyright material is reproduced with the permission of the Controller of HMSO and the Queen's Printer for Scotland. Click-use licence number C02W0004089. Material is reproduced from the original 10 Downing Street source, but may not be the most up-to-date version of the briefings, which might be revised at the original source. Users should check with the original source in case of revisions. Comments are © Copyright contributors. Everything else is © Copyright Downing Street Says.

» Thursday, February 12, 2004

PM Speech/Education

No Comments »

Post a public comment

Search

Supported by

Recent Briefings

Archives

Links

Syndicate (RSS/XML)

Credits

Enquiries