School Buildings (Hansard, 13 January 1992)

§ Ms. Walley
To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science what is his estimate of the expenditure required to bring the existing school building stock to the standard required by School Building Regulations.

§ Mr. Fallon
The results of the survey of school buildings—SSB—published by the Department in November 1987 indicated that the cost of bringing school premises up to the accommodation standards defined in the Education (School Premises) Regulations 1981, and to an acceptable state of repair, for 1991 pupil numbers, was about £2 billion at November 1987 prices. We have no later estimate than this figure, which was based upon returns by LEAs in respect of some 800 primary and secondary schools. Between 1986–87 and 1989–90 LEAs spent over £2 billion on school buildings, a significant proportion of which will have gone on remedying the deficiencies noted in the SSB.

§ Ms. Walley
To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science if he will give his estimate of the increase in expenditure on maintenance to school buildings required to deal with the problems identified in the National Audit Office report on property management.

§ Mr. Fallon
As the NAO report made clear, local authorities are responsible for the maintenance of their school buildings. It is for individual LEAs, not the Government, to decide what to spend from within the resources available to them in order to keep schools in a satisfactory state of repair.

§ Ms. Walley
To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science if he will give for each education454W authority his assumption for the amount required to be spent on school building repairs within the expenditure forecast.

§ Mr. Fallon
The Government's 1992–93 local authority finance settlement allows for standard spending on education by local authorities collectively to be 7.1 per cent. higher than this year's figure, which in turn allowed for a substantial increase in standard spending over 1990–91. Within this framework it is for individual local authorities to determine how much to spend on education and the pattern of spending within education, in the light of local needs and circumstances. Local authorities' standard spending assessments do not contain a separately identifiable element for school building repairs.