It could be at least six years before a long-planned new secondary school is built in Preston as part of a major shift in strategy set to be considered by Lancashire County Council.
A decision over where the 600-pupil facility should be developed has been repeatedly delayed since January under both the previous Conservative and current Reform UK administrations at the authority.
That uncertainty was finally set to be removed at a cabinet meeting next week, when one of two possible sites was expected to be picked – but it has now emerged that members will instead be asked to approve expansions of existing schools in order to meet demand for more places.
In that scenario, delivery of the new establishment would be pushed back to 2031 at the earliest, having previously been judged to be needed by September 2027.
A report by education bosses to be presented to the cabinet next Thursday suggests that a brand new school would not yet be financially viable, because of the number of pupils it is estimated would initially be admitted.
It also concludes that boosting student numbers at other schools in the area would be more “cost effective” – with the bill coming in at £13m as opposed to the up to £41m price tag for a new-build. Several schools have both the “capacity and willingness” to expand so as to meet the need arising from 2027, cabinet members will be told.
The then Tory-run authority approved the blueprint for a new school to serve North West Preston in October 2022 – but the proposal has its roots in a ‘masterplan’ for housing expansion in the area which dates all the way back to 2017.
That document was drawn up by Preston City Council and set out the services that would be required to accommodate the development of 5,500 new homes across a 20-year period – more than half of which have since been completed.
The two sites in the running for the new school are less than two miles apart – one at Maxy Lane Farm in Higher Bartle, on land between Sandy Lane and Tabley Lane, and the other where the now demolished Tulketh High School once stood on Tag Lane in Ingol.
The Higher Bartle plot has been reserved for a secondary school since planning permission was granted for it in January 2022 as part of a yet-to-be-built estate of 320 homes.
While that site has been identified as the county council’s preferred option, the authority has kept the former Tulketh High land – which lies outside of the masterplan area – in reserve as a plan B because of ongoing delays in acquiring Maxy Lane Farm.
The Conservatives set “late March” as what was then presented as a final cut-off point for a decision between the two if the target date for opening the school was going to be met – but a choice had still not been made before the party lost control of the county council to Reform at May’s local elections.
In July, the new cabinet member for education and skills, Matthew Salter, told a meeting of the full council that the matter was expected to be put before September’s cabinet gathering – but, as the Local Democracy Reporting Service later revealed, the issue was ultimately rescheduled for the meeting taking place next week.
Although he also previously said that the new facility might not be needed until September 2028 if “temporary works” were carried out at other secondary schools in the vicinity “to manage demand for places”, there has been no suggestion up until now that delivery of the new school would be pushed back into the next decade.
In a statement issued alongside publication of the cabinet report, County Cllr Salter said: “We’re committed to ensuring every child in Lancashire has access to high-quality education close to home.
“Through positive discussions with local schools, we now have the opportunity to deliver the places families need in the right locations at really successful schools.
“Designing and delivering a new secondary school takes at least three years, so it’s essential we explore a range of solutions to deliver places for Lancashire children in a sustainable way.”
However, the county council’s Liberal Democrat group leader, John Potter – who represents the Preston West division in which the former Tulketh High site sits, but who has strongly backed the Higher Bartle option – blasted the latest proposed delay to the new facility.
Having regularly criticised the previous Conservative administration over the failure to start building the school before now, he says he “won’t let residents forget” it if Reform agree to the wholesale rethink that is now on the table.
“Thousands of family homes have been built – with thousands more coming – but we have no new schools for those families to go to.
“Families that have spent hundreds of thousands of pounds buying a house in northern Preston have been betrayed.
“Current schools will see enormous extra pressure placed on them and [there will be] huge increases in traffic and disruption across Fulwood and Ashton as hundreds – maybe thousands – of extra car journeys to existing schools clog our roads and pavements.
“Every time a crucial decision needs to be made – and money needs to be spent – magical new statistics appear saying the schools aren’t required. It’s nonsense and insults the intelligence of people in north and west Preston,” County Cllr Potter said.
Lancashire County Council has provided 715 new secondary school places in Preston and neighbouring Longridge – via expansions of existing schools – over the past two years in order to plug a previous shortfall. Additional places were also provided in secondaries in South Ribble for pupils travelling from across the border from Preston.
Doing the maths
According to estimates contained in the report to be presented to cabinet members next week, it is expected that Preston will be two forms – or classes – short of secondary school places by next year.
That number falls short of the four forms of entry that Department for Education guidance says are required in order to make a new school financially viable.
However, the gap in Preston does rise close to that level, at 3.5 forms, just 12 months later, in the 2027/28 academic year – when it had previously been intended that the new school would open.
The report states that there is therefore ”an immediate need to provide places through expansion of existing schools, whilst keeping the option of a new school available to us in the future, if required”.
Cabinet will hear that several schools – which are not being publicly identified at this stage – have expressed an interest in expanding to bridge the shortfall – all of which are rated ‘Good’ or ‘Outstanding’ by Ofsted.
A further 1.5 forms of entry are nevertheless still predicted to be required in Preston by 2031.
Meanwhile, if housing development progresses at the rate expected, a total of eight new forms – above today’s level – will be required by 2035.
The report notes that such demand exceeds the extra capacity that can be generated by school expansions alone – and so would still require a brand new facility to be built.
But it warns that expanding schools in the short term could lead to a shortfall of between just one and three forms in the 2030s – meaning that a new establishment created then would face the same potential viability problem as one that was constructed now. However, pupil numbers are declining nationally – and it remains to be seen how this trend will affect Preston in the years to come.
If the county council’s cabinet agrees to the plan put before it next week, the costs of the capital programme needed to expand existing Preston secondary schools would be calculated and presented to full council for approval.
Cabinet members would then be asked to make the final decision to go ahead with those expansions and also whether to retain the Tulketh High site for a new school in the future – and whether to continue to pursue the land at Maxy Lane Farm in Higher Bartle, which is still not in the authority’s possession, to accommodate a new facility “for 2031 and beyond”.
