London needs £480m to tackle shortfall in primary school places

London’s boroughs need at least £480 million to ensure every five year-old has a school place over the next five years, according to London Councils.

Most London boroughs are dealing with an explosion in demand for primary school places, with new analysis predicting that the growth in reception pupil numbers will result in a shortfall in permanent primary school places of more than 28,000 by 2014/15.

The shortfall in the capital is expected to be much greater than the rest of England. Projections provided to Partnership for Schools by all local authorities in England show that the growth in the primary school population will be 143 per cent higher in London compared to the rest of England. This means that for every 100 places that need to be provided in the rest of England, 243 will need to be provided in London.

To cope with demand, boroughs in London are being forced to use temporary classrooms - more than 5,000 primary school pupils could be in temporary classrooms in the 2010/11 school year.

Last year London Councils revealed that the rise in demand for primary school places in the capital was due to an unexpected and significant rise in London’s birth rate combined with the impacts of the recession.

During the recession London’s property market effectively stalled, meaning that fewer parents moved out of the capital compared to previous years. Financial concerns – combined with the significant improvement to state primary schools in the capital – also led to fewer parents electing to send their child to a private school.

While London Councils successfully made the case to government that boroughs were facing exceptional circumstances and needed emergency funding, the amount provided – £140 million – was not nearly enough to cope with demand.

And with capital funding to boroughs set to be significantly cut in the current spending review period, concerns are growing across the capital about how to provide the school places needed by young Londoners.

London Councils’ executive member for children and young people councillor Steve Reed said:
“This is quite clearly a problem that won’t just disappear. While we are seeing the greatest pressures down at primary school level, these kids will be making their way up the years through to secondary schools – and, frankly, we need to do better for them.

“While the current focus is on cuts, this is an area where we need much more investment, not less. The real test of a government is not how much it saves, but what it chooses to spend its money on. Ensuring a decent start to the education of thousands of young Londoners seems a very good place to start.”