FANCY a new school? Hey, have 200. Yes, when it comes to education, the Government is feeling generous. By 2010, 200 city academies are planned and a separate scheme, Building Schools for the Future (BSF) will refurbish or rebuild every secondary school over the next 15 years.
Great news. But builders, whose input is, er, vital, don’t seem very excited. After all, there’s a “glut of work”, says Building (Jan 13). The Olympics will take up a large slice of construction capacity in the capital, where 60 academies are planned. Plus, the cost of bidding is high. “There’s no guarantee that you’ll even pre-qualify, let alone get the actual project,” says Stephen Jones, customer director for the builders Taylor Woodrow. Builders suggest setting up a framework for pre-qualified contractors who could share the workload and learn from each other.
Another solution is to merge both programmes and use the private sponsorship funds academies attract to run schools instead.
But are councils being put under “unreasonable pressure” to build academies in the first place? The Government says that they should be “considered” as part of BSF plans, but if they don’t build, they risk losing BSF funding, says the Association of Teachers and Lecturers in Public Finance (Jan 13).