Agenda item

Growth Fund Update and 2019/20 Request from Schools Block Budget

To receive and consider a report containing the Growth Fund update and 2019/20 request from Schools Block Budget.

Minutes:

Piers Brunning, Senior Specialist (People and Place), Strategy and Commissioning presented the Growth Fund Update and 2019/20 request from Schools Block Budget report which was set out in agenda pages 25-29.

 

Piers Brunning stated that the Local Authority had a statutory duty to provide school places for the residents in the Borough.  He explained that there was a conflict of interest in the national arrangements, in that Schools Forum did not have direct responsibility for the provision of school places, however it was responsible for agreeing the Growth Fund Budget.  He stated that without the Growth Fund agreement it was not possible for the Local Authority to plan the increase in additional capacity in the Borough.

 

Piers Brunning stated that, despite a reduction in birth rates, one of the pressures that were identified was in relation to primary school places, due to the exceptional rate of new house building in the Borough. 

 

Piers Brunning stated that the new developments were concentrated in certain areas of the Borough.

 

Piers Brunning stated that the Shinfield West School could have opened in temporary accommodation in 2016, however due to publicity around that time, around 30 children that could have been placed at Shinfield West were placed at other schools.  Last year all the school places in local schools in the Shinfield area were filled, and the Local Authority was in need of a new school in that area.

 

Piers Brunning stated that a few years ago there had been a shortage of school places in the Earley area, with children at the time having to be diverted out of the area.  The political view was that it was not acceptable to have to send children to schools out of their area of residence.

 

Piers Brunning informed that there was no data as to who moved into new houses, however the new houses that were being built were family homes, therefore there was an expectation that the demand for school places would increase.  He stated that GP registration information was not a reliable source of data, as people sometimes did not register their family with a new GP.

 

During the discussion of the item the following comments were made:

 

·           Members asked if Piers Brunning had taken into account the fact that people were living longer and were having fewer children;

·           Piers stated that he had taken that into account and pointed out that there was a significant cost to school transport if children had to be transported to a school far away from their residence;

·           Members asked if there had been a consideration of the impact of building new schools to existing schools;

·           Piers Brunning stated that there had been a consultation on the plans for new schools;

·           In response to a question Piers Brunning stated that academy schools were their own admission authorities and therefore could set their own admission numbers;

·           Piers Stated that the current legal advice was that schools were not obliged to carry on with their Published Admission Number (PAN) through all school years;

·           Members were worried that there was an assumption that families with young children were moving into the new houses, and that may not be the case;

·           Piers Brunning explained that capital decisions had to be made to plan for the future, however it was impossible to be completely accurate with predictions, and this was acknowledged in the Primary School Strategy;

·           Piers Brunning stated that the actual number of school applications for entry into September 2019 would not be known until 15 January, very late in the budget setting process;

·           Members were informed that there was a very small window of opportunity to change the Budget if there was an indication that setting up a new school would be disastrous for existing schools;

·           Some members felt anxious about the accuracy of predictions based on the last 3-4 years, when schools were perhaps opened too early, having a catastrophic effect on admission numbers of existing school;

·           Members questioned if it was cost effective to open a number of small schools rather than investing in bigger schools;

·           Some members stated that it might be useful to see an analysis of how accurate predictions had been in the past;

·           Jim Leviers was interested to know if members could offer a better model to predict numbers;

·           In response to a question Piers Brunning stated that there had been a Borough wide debate about the infrastructure around the building of new communities and consultation about the proposed new schools;

·           Piers Brunning added that some of the existing schools had site constraints which limited their expansion, including in relation to lack of car parking.

 

Members asked that Piers Brunning be invited to attend all meetings where Growth Fund was due to be discussed.

 

Carol Cammiss stated that she was aware of the pressures and understood the concerns that Schools Forum had raised.  She offered to discuss these issues with the Executive Member and bring back a review to Schools Forum for further discussion.

 

In response to a question Piers Brunning stated that the £800k Growth Fund Budget for 2019/20 was for a range of planned expansion of school places, for both current commitments and new schools.  He explained that should a decision be made not to proceed with a new school, this would be credited back to the Growth Fund.

 

RESOLVED That Schools Forum approves the Growth Fund Budget of £800,000 for 2019/20.

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