EDUCATIONAL VENUES TOP PRIORITY


This May, the first school will open under the government-led Priority Schools Building Programme. In sight of this, Tomorrow’s Flooring put together a profile on the programme and spoke to two flooring companies who have been involved in PSBP installations of their own.


Launched in April 2011, the Priority Schools Building Programme (PSBP) came after Education Minister, Michael Gove, scrapped the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme that had been announced by Labour back in 2004. Under the Coalition government, it was canned in July 2010, with Gove citing the £55billion plan to rebuild every single one of England’s 3,500 secondary schools as ‘wasteful’.


Whatever the benefits the scheme may have had, the facts are undeniable. After just two years of the programme, only five of the 72 authorities which had joined the scheme were ready to start building. As the project closed,


52 of the 124 schools built under the programme were audited as either ‘poor’ or ‘mediocre’. Around 150 schools were left uncertain as to whether or not their building plans would go ahead or not, and in the end, only around half did.


Naturally, some form of replacement was needed. The PSBP was established with a £2.4billion budget, which then gained another £1billion further down the line. It will focus not on every secondary school but just on those in most need of investment. The scheme had nearly 600 applicants, of which 261 were successful. The scope now reaches primary schools also, and


FACTS AND FIGURES


£18BILLION IS BEING SPENT ON SCHOOL BUILDINGS IN CURRENT PARLIAMENT.


PLANNING WORK HAS STARTED WITH 85% OF SCHOOLS ON THE PSBP.


Under BSF, it took four years from the programme being announced for construction work to start at


the first school. Under PSBP, this has been cut to a year.


DELIVERED BY THE END OF 2017, TWO YEARS EARLIER THAN ORIGINALLY PLANNED.


The first school will open by May 2014, ahead of schedule.


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Construction work is underway at 24 schools (9% of the programme) including four


under Early Works Agreements. www.tomorrowsflooring.com ALL SCHOOLS WILL BE


STARTED WITH ALL SCHOOLS BY THE END OF 2014.


PLANNING WILL HAVE


£2.4billion of funding is to address need through the PSBP.


alternative categories of schools, such as community schools and academies.


The Government’s Education Funding Agency (EFA) will be in charge of assigning contractors for each batch of projects, and will meet with the school heads to discuss specific priorities and needs. The first school is set to open this May, planning will have started on every school by the end of this year and it is hoped that all schools will be fully complete by the close of 2017.


We spoke to two companies, CSC Screeding and Recofloor, who have been involved in installations of their own through the PSBP.


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