As part of its commitment to level up opportunity, the Prime Minister has announced today an ambitious ten-year programme that will transform 500 school buildings across England, so every child has access to the best learning environment, no matter where they go to school. Belvidere School in Shrewsbury is amongst the first wave of schools to take part in the Government’s transformational School Rebuilding Programme.
Backed by £1 billion in government funding, 50 schools represent the first initial wave of the programme, which will rebuild and repair primary, secondary and specialist schools as well as sixth form colleges around England, with 70 per cent located in the North and Midlands.
These refurbishments will help create modern learning environment by delivering new classrooms and science labs to sports hall and dining halls, with most of the projects expected to be completed within three to five years.
This programme will also create vital jobs and apprenticeships in the construction industry, with suppliers offering training opportunities as part of their work on the rebuilds. Through its continued commitment to achieve its net zero target, the Government is also ensuring these schools will be built greener – supporting green jobs as it builds Britain back better, fairer and greener.
This is great news for Shrewsbury, it is so important that every child in the country gets the world class education they deserve.
In the sixteen years that I have been MP for Shrewsbury, I have lobbied for better education facilities for schools in rural counties like Shropshire. We have made real progress in achieving a fairer funding formula for our schools, and this commitment from Government to improve our educational buildings means that we can provide modern, state of the art facilities so that pupils can learn in an environment that enables them to reach their full potential.
The Government will deliver the world class education facilities our children deserve by:
- Introducing our ten-year plan to transform schools in each region of the country, which starts with our £1 billion investment this year. On 29 June 2020, the Prime Minister announced that schools across England will benefit from a transformative ten-year rebuilding programme, with investment targeted towards school buildings in the worst condition as part of our plan to level up opportunity for all. Our programme begins this year, with the first 50 projects now confirmed and backed by £1 billion in government funding (Prime Minister’s Office, Press Release, 29 June 2020, link; Prime Minister’s Office, Press Release, 30 June 2020, link.
- Investing £1.8 billion to maintain schools across the country, helping deliver the best possible learning environments for every child, no matter where they go to school. As part of our ambitious 10-year programme to rebuild schools throughout England, we announced £1.8 billion in our Spending Review to repair and improve the condition of school buildings in 2021-22, and we are also providing funding to bring all Further Education college estates in England up to a good condition. (HMT, Spending Review 2020, 25 November 2020, link).
- Re-affirming our commitment to levelling up education by increasing the schools budget to nearly £50 million in 2021-22. We are raising the schools budget to £49.8 billion in 2021-22, representing an increase of £2.2 billion, and re-iterating our commitment to increase the core schools budget by £7.1 billion by 2022-23 compared to 2019-20 funding levels - as part of the our three year investment in schools, which represents the biggest funding boost for schools in a decade (HMT, Spending Review 2020, 25 November 2020, link).