Agenda item

Report of the Portfolio Holder for Education and Skills  

The Board considered the report of the Portfolio Holder for Education and Skills seeking approval in advance of receipt of the funding announcement on the School Capital Maintenance Grant Allocations for 2019/20 to enable project prioritisation and delivery to commence once funding has been allocated.

RESOLVED to:

(1)  Delegate authority to the Corporate Director of Children and Adults to accept the School Capital Maintenance Funding grant allocation from the Department for Education (DfE) to Nottingham City Council;

(2)  Delegate authority to the Corporate Director of Children and Adults to allocate funding from the School Capital Maintenance funding grant to the projects detailed in the published appendix A

(3)  Note that £0.173 million is set aside as a contingency fund to allow the adjustment of the number of projects prioritised in the published appendix A;

(4)  Approve £0.0025 million to allow the scoping and prioritisation fro a programme of works in 2020/21 to commence in Autumn 2019 with Nottingham City Council Design Services delivering these works;

(5)  Amend the capital Programme to include the allocation of the grant;

(6)  Delegate authority to the Corporate Director of Children and Adults to make adjustments of the number of projects prioritised in the published appendix A and the contingency should it ne necessary;

(7)  Delegate Authority to Corporate director for Children and Adults to allocate contingency funding to projects such as health and safety or condition issues which arise during 2019/20, and to adjust the funding allocation for each project once cost information is finalised, subject to value for money being demonstrated and costs being within the overall budget allocated for this programme of works.

(8)  Appoint NCC Design Services to design, procure and manage the projects

(9)  Approve the procurement of the works through the East Midlands Regional construction framework – an OJEU (the Official Journal of the European Union) compliant framework

(10)Delegate authority to the Head of Legal Services to sign contracts with the preferred contractors following procurement exercises to allow the projects to be delivered

(11)Approve a payment of £0.100m from the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) Lifecycle Reserve fund to Rosehill Special School to undertake condition and maintenance works to the building.

Reasons for Decision

The prioritisation of thefundingis based on advice received and an extensive reviewofschools.There are two areas where fundinghasbeen prioritised:

·  Health andSafetyissues likely to impacton children and staff.

·  Conditionissues likelyto impactonthe operation ofthe school.

The balance of thefundingfor the School Condition grant has been identified as partof theprioritisation process and£0.173million will be held as a contingencyamount to deal with urgenthealth and safetyor condition issues thatarise duringthe financial year 2019/20.Delegatingauthorityto the CorporateDirectorforChildren and Adults toapprove theseprojects will enable a swiftresponse tourgentissues as theyarise.

It is assumed thattheDfEwill continue to allocatethe Capital Maintenance grant toLocalAuthorities. Inorderto planaheadfor thedeliveryof future schemes,£0.025million will be allocated tobegin theprioritisation fora programme of works in 2020/21. Further approvals willbe sought to allocate fundingto this programme ofworks in Spring2020 on the assumption that fundingwillbe allocated by the DfE.Thisforward planningwill ensure that the Local Authoritypreparesfor deliveryand sets out a clear programme of future works to maintain schools, subject to fundingbeing received.

Rosehill SpecialSchool was rebuilt under wave 2of theBSF programme. As part of thisprogrammeto meet the requirements of the Departmentfor Education (DfE),both the school and the City Councilhad to committo fundinga lifecycle fundso that the buildingcould be maintainedto the same standard as a newPrivateFinanceInitiative (PFI) schoolfor 25 years. Rosehill Special School has nowbeenoperationalfor eight years and the schoolare undertakingminor works to the buildingthat will improve the educationenvironment, health &safetyand security. The works willbe procured directlybythe school inline withfinancial regulations and with the supportofthe MajorProjects team

Other Options Considered

Consideration was given to combine the ConditionfundingandtheBasic Need funding.Ifcombined thisfundingcouldbeused to address the shortfallin school placesacross the city.

Consideration was also given to amalgamatingthe Condition grantwith broader CityCouncil capitalfunding.

Bothof these optionshavebeen rejected,as they would leave schools at risk of closure through healthand safetyor conditionissues. It would also mean that

schoolbuildings would continueto deteriorate, increasingthe risk of forced closure for emergencyrepairs.

With regard Rosehill School, to‘do nothing’ has beenrejected as, while this would retain the fundingwithin the Lifecycle Reserve; it would not supportthe maintenanceof theschoolas a positive environmentforeducation