Education secretary Bridget Phillipson has ordered a review of the mainstream free schools programme announced by the former government.
The Department for Education will look at 44 mainstream free school projects that have not yet opened to see whether they meet a need for places in their area and offer value for money.
In a statement, Ms Phillipson said some of the funding “could have been put to better use improving the deteriorating condition of our existing schools and colleges”.
‘Substantial funds’ allocated under last government
The DfE will write to local authorities and academy trusts with unopened projects to set out the next steps.
Reviews will also take into account whether the new free school would provide a distinctive curriculum and have an impact on existing local providers.
The DfE will only look at mainstream free schools approved by central government. Free schools delivered by local authority competitions or special and alternative provision free schools are not affected.
More detail on the schools in scope to be reviewed will be set out “in due course”.
“Substantial funds” were allocated to the free schools programme under the last government, which often resulted in “surpluses in school capacity”, Ms Phillipson said in her statement.
Threat to ‘quality of wider school system’
“Not only is this poor value for money, but the oversupply of places can be detrimental to the other, more established schools in that area - who might lose pupils, as well as teachers, to their new competitor,” she added.
The chair of the New Schools Network (NSN), which closed after losing a DfE contract to support free schools, said last year that the free schools policy had “lost its way”. This posed a threat to the “quality of the wider school system”, chair of trustees David Ross warned at the time.
In 2017, the National Audit Office said of the 113,500 new places in mainstream free schools scheduled to be delivered by 2021, around 57,500 would bring spare capacity to the area.
Meanwhile, five schools have been added to the School Rebuilding Programme this morning, which funds major rebuilding or refurbishment works.
The schools are Baildon C of E Primary, Cherry Tree Academy, Christ Church CofE Academy, Hodge Hill College and Kenton Primary School.
Unions welcome free school review
Teaching unions have welcomed the education secretary’s decision to review proposed free schools.
The NAHT school leaders’ union general secretary, Paul Whiteman, said the government must use the budget at the end of the month to instead commit more capital funding to help repair the school estate.
Pepe Di’lasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, also said additional investment is needed in school buildings. He questioned whether the scale of the problem with the school estate can be “adequately addressed simply by moving money earmarked for school buildings around”. Mr Di’Iasio added that a new, less complicated system for opening new schools should be developed.
Local authorities should be given the powers and funding to open new schools to respond to place needs, said Daniel Kebede, the NEU teaching union’s general secretary.
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