Surrey to get 600 more school places, but still faces £215 million funding gap
Linda Kemeny, Surrey County Council Cabinet Member for Schools and Learning
Surrey gets 4,100 school places, but still faces £215 million funding gap
Schools opened after the summer break with space for more than 4,100 extra pupils, but Surrey County Council has warned that plugging a £215 million funding gap for 13,000 further places is becoming increasingly tough.
“I’m pleased we have ensured more than 4,100 additional pupils can learn in Surrey schools but it is going to get harder and harder for us to find the £215 million we need over the next five years for the 13,000 further places the county desperately needs" said Cabinet Member for Schools and Learning Linda Kemeny.
Currently, the Department for Education will be contributing £112m towards those places, which falls short of the £327m required to meet unprecedented demand.
Surrey’s school places funding shortfall comes despite residents making a net contribution of £6 billion annually to the Exchequer and getting less than £1bn back.
Mrs Kemeny said: “Since 2010 we have created 10,300 new places for pupils – enough to fill nearly 345 classrooms – and will continue to pull out all the stops to guarantee every Surrey child gets a place at a local school.
“However, with Surrey’s tight budgets getting ever tighter, it will become increasingly difficult and as no other part of the country pays so much into the national coffers and gets so little back any extra help from the government for this mammoth task would be gratefully received.”