1.1 The Department for Children, Schools and Families (the Department), announced the Building Schools for the Future programme (BSF) in 2003 to renew all 3,500 secondary schools in England and facilitate its ultimate aim of improving educational attainment and the life choices available to children.
1.2 It aims for BSF to be a move away from a patch and mend approach to planning the renewal of schools across the whole of a Local Authority's estate. It has prioritised areas of deprivation and low educational attainment to receive funding first.
1.3 BSF aims to rebuild half of the secondary school estate, extensively remodel 35 per cent and refurbish 15 per cent. BSF also funds new ICT equipment (Figure 2 overleaf). Recently refurbished schools will only get new ICT equipment. The Department also encourages Local Authorities to use BSF to match school provision to demand, by building new schools or merging and closing existing ones.
1.4 When it launched the programme, the Department said it would finish the renewal of all schools "within 10 to 15 years from 2005-06".1 It now intends to have agreed contracts to renew the last schools by 2020 (15 years from 2005-06), but these schools might be built at any time up to 2023.
1.5 Through BSF, the Department aims to achieve significant improvements in the delivery of new schools, including:
i Better strategic planning of the type and location of schools, the physical environment and facilities to be included. All Local Authorities have been given an indication of when they will join the programme and how much funding will be available. They are encouraged to assess how best to use funding across their school estate to ensure the number, location and types of school meet local needs, and how each new school building can best meet the school's objectives.
ii Effective long-term partnering between Local Authorities and the private sector. The Local Education Partnerships (LEPs) procurement model allows a Local Authority to work with a private sector partner for ten years to improve schools, rather than tendering each project separately.
iii Central programme management. Partnerships for Schools (PfS) coordinates delivery, provides standardised planning and procurement processes and helps to control costs.
1.6 The Department has provided £3.6 billion of capital funding up to March 2008 and plans another £7.5 billion up to March 2011. The Department expects Local Authorities to fund some of the capital costs and nearly all the revenue costs for planning, procuring and managing projects (Figure 3 overleaf). Fifty-two per cent of capital funding is expected to be provided as capital grant, 41 per cent under the private finance initiative (PFI) and the remainder under supported borrowing (Figure 4 overleaf). The Department stopped using supported borrowing after 2007.
2 | Classification of the levels of school renewal |
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Level of build | Level of build description | Expected proportion of schools to be renewed to this level (by floor area) % | Typical capital funding per pupil £ | ICT Infrastructure and Hardware per pupil £ | Typical funding route | |
Rebuild | The school is entirely rebuilt. Includes new schools where there (PFI) is no existing school. | 50 | 8,028 | 1,675 | ||
Remodel | The existing school building is extensively developed, normally involving substantial structural reworking. | 35 | 3,660 | 1,675 | Capital grant | |
Refurbish | The existing school building is renovated without substantial structural reworking. Includes schools where only the ICT equipment is replaced. | 15 | 318 | 1,675 | Capital grant | |
Source: National Audit Office analysis of PfS papers |
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NOTE Funding presented at January 2007 prices and based on a typical mainstream 11-16 school of 1050 pupils. Capital funding increases at the same rate as public construction inflation. Capital funding includes furniture and equipment. | ||||||
3 | Who pays for what? |
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| Local Authority and school contributions | |
Capital costs | ■ Funding to meet minimum building standards for schools (based on forecast pupil numbers) ■ Funding to cover some "abnormals" (e.g. flood defences or asbestos removal) ■ Funding for initial ICT equipment ■ Design costs | ■ Land (normally previous school sites) ■ Funding of features beyond minimum standards ■ Additional ICT equipment (often including a sinking fund for new equipment after five years)
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Administration costs of procurement
| ■ Contribution towards Local Authority's project management costs. ■ Legal costs associated with the set up of the LEP and PFI project companies
| Pays all other costs of ■ developing strategy (additional staff, senior management time and advisers) ■ procurement (additional staff, senior management time and advisers) ■ consultation | |
Operational costs | ■ Some maintenance costs of PFI schools (double the contribution of prior PFI schemes) | ■ Any cost of change management (e.g. training) ■ Contract management costs ■ All maintenance costs of non-PFI schools ■ Maintenance costs of PFI schools (above that included in the Department's contributions towards PFI costs) | |
Source: National Audit Office analysis of contracts and funding model | |||
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1 2003 consultation and 2004 launch prospectus.