Jess Phillips – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Education

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Jess Phillips on 2016-04-12.

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many of the 22 new free schools announced by her Department on 5 February 2016 will be located in but not adjacent to planning areas where there will be a need for additional school places by September 2017.

Edward Timpson

Of the 22 new free schools announced on 5 February 2016, 17 are mainstream schools for which basic need in the areas was assessed. Five of the 22 schools are not mainstream schools, so have been excluded; basic need does not apply in their application. Of these 17 schools, 13 are in planning areas where there is projected to be a need for places in September 2017.

When assessing both the basic need for places in the local area and the standards of local schools, we define local schools as those that fall within the ‘straight-line’ distance of the proposed free school location within which at least 80% of the pupils in the area travel to school (at the relevant phase). This is intended to act as a proxy catchment area for the new free school. The local area is then defined as the planning areas in which these local schools are situated. Of the 17 schools, 15 have need for 2017 and one has need beyond 2017.