Education Funding Agency issues contract notice for fourth batch of privately-financed schools to come to market

Schoold design

The Education Funding Agency has started the search for a main contractor for the fourth batch of schools to come to market through the privately-financed element of the government’s flagship school building programme.

In a contract notice published this week, the EFA said the batch of schools in Yorkshire comprises eight schools and is worth up to £120m.

The winning bidder will design, build, finance and maintain the schools under the government’s new private finance model (Pf2), which will use an organisation to provide debt funding for all of the privately-financed schools batches, rather than each batch having to secure its own funding.

The EFA adopted the aggregator model after it had struggled to raise long-term debt funding for its Pf2 programme.

The schools in the batch are:

  • All Saints Catholic College, Huddersfield
  • Belle Vue Boys’ School, Bradford;
  • Carlton Bolling College, Bradford
  • Harrogate High School, Harrogate
  • Oakbank School, Keighley
  • Samuel Lister Academy, Bradford
  • Whitcliffe Mount Business and Enterprise College, Huddersfield

The Yorkshire batch is the fourth privately-financed batch of schools to come to market.

In December Building revealed Morgan Sindall, Laing O’Rourke and Vinci Construction have been shortlisted for the £93m batch of schools in the North-west,

In September, Miller Construction and Sir Robert McAlpine were shortlisted for the £120m batch of schools in the North-east, which was the second batch of private finance schools to come to market through the PSBP, while in August, Wates, Morgan Sindall and Interserve were shortlisted for the first batch of Pf2 schools, a £150m batch in the Hertfordshire, Luton and Reading area.

The final batch of Pf2 schools - a £122m batch in the Midlands - is expected to come to market in April.

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