Building grants are tied to classroom standards

Byers Launches "Something For Something" Strategy

More than £1 billion is on offer from Schools Standards Minister, Stephen Byers, but he wants what he calls "something for something".

Existing classrooms are in a poor state of repair

The new money comes from last month's Budget. It is to be spent on re-building and re-equipping crumbling classrooms. Unlike previous capital schemes, the money will come in specific grants. It will not, as in the past, come in the form of permission for education authorities to borrow.

£83 million is available this year and £250 million in each of the following four years.

The money is badly needed. It is estimated it will cost more than £3 billion simply to keep existing buildings in use. A survey, last year, found more than 600 primary schools with outside toilets and three quarters of a million pupils being taught in temporary buildings.

The government has called the state of Britain's classrooms a "chronic Tory legacy".