School programme is on track, says Knight

15 Jun 09
Schools minister Jim Knight has defended the Building Schools for the Future programme after the National Audit Office highlighted rising costs and delays.

By Tash Shifrin

Schools minister Jim Knight has defended the Building Schools for the Future programme after the National Audit Office highlighted rising costs and delays.

Schools minister Jim Knight has defended the Building Schools for the Future programme after the National Audit Office highlighted rising costs and delays.

Knight also claimed the programme was in a ‘pretty strong position’ despite problems with securing private finance for BSF schemes in the credit crunch.

His defence comes as the Learning and Skills Council began a review of further education college building schemes – on which all new funding decisions have been suspended until March.

The NAO said the estimated total capital cost of the BSF programme had risen from £45bn to between £52bn and £55bn because of the growing scope of the programme and high building-cost inflation.

To meet government targets, annual expenditure would have to rise from £2.5bn to between £3.4bn and £3.7bn, at current prices, from 2010/11, the NAO said in its February 12 report.

Edward Leigh, chair of the Public Accounts Committee, said: ‘Four years into the programme, only 42 schools have opened, yet the department is confidently predicting that it will manage to open 250 schools per year after 2011. Given the rate of progress so far, this seems fanciful.’

But Knight said the programme was now on schedule ‘in terms of year-on-year targets’. He reaffirmed political backing for BSF, which had been questioned after the Pre-Budget Report said its value for money would be assessed.

‘That doesn’t mean there’s some kind of weird plot to cut it. The commitment’s as strong as it’s ever been,’ he said. But Knight admitted that the government planned to spend £3.1bn a year on the scheme – at least £300m less than the NAO estimated was needed.

Knight acknowledged that the credit crunch had resulted in fewer banks being willing to lend to BSF schemes. But he said six were ‘considering returning to the market’.

Norwich Union and the Nationwide Building Society were also supporting some schemes and the European Investment bank would provide £300m, Knight said. ‘We’re not out of the woods... But I think we’re in a pretty strong position, particularly compared with much of the public sector.’

The credit crunch has had a harsher effect in the further education sector. Former Audit Commission controller Sir Andrew Foster has been appointed to review building plans.

In a parliamentary answer, FE minister Siôn Simon said: ‘There are signs that the ability of colleges to raise their own funds for projects is being affected.’

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