HC Deb 09 January 2003 vol 397 cc339-40W
Mrs. May

To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills pursuant to his answer of 20 November 2002,Official Report, column 142–43W, on education facilities (Wokingham), if he will place in the Library the list of criteria against which the PFI proposals were judged; why these criteria were chosen, what the (a) scoring system and (b) methodology used to assess the criteria were against which the PFI proposals were judged; and what weighting was given to each criterion when converting the scores into the ranking of the PFI proposal. [89253]

Mr. Miliband

Proposals from local education authorities for the 2003–04 schools PFI bidding round were assessed against five main criteria:

  1. (a) the extent to which the project would contribute to raising educational standards and to tackling the most urgent premises related needs;
  2. (b) the contribution to wider DfES and school priorities and initiatives;
  3. (c) the contribution to wider Government priorities and initiatives;
  4. (d) value-for-money;
  5. (e) the contribution to the future development of public private partnerships, including PFI.

I have today placed a full copy of the bidding guidance for the 2003–04 PFI round in the Library.

Each proposal was evaluated independently by two officials from the Department's schools private finance unit and moderated through discussion with the full team of assessors. Technical assessment was provided by external quantity surveyors and the advice of other officials in the Department was sought, where appropriate.

The scores were weighted across the first three criteria, as follows:

  1. (a) 40 per cent.
  2. (b) 30 per cent.
  3. (c) 30 per cent.

Criteria (d) and (e) were not included in the above weightings but assessed on a pass or fail basis.