Theresa May promises £500m towards 140 new free schools as she kicks off grammar school revolution
The new free schools will create a further 70,000 new places
THERESA May today pledges to step up her crusade to get every poorer child a good school place by opening 140 more free schools.
Many of those schools could be selective as they will open when May’s major grammar schools expansion kicks in from 2020.
The government will also pick up the tab for longer journeys to existing grammars for kids whose parents can’t afford expensive homes nearby.
The 140 new free schools it will pay for will create a further 70,000 new places to take the total number of them to more than 800.
The significant majority of the latest batch could also be selective as they will open when May’s major grammar schools expansion kicks in from 2020.
And among them will be specific cash for specialist schools that concentrate on excellent in specific disciplines such as Maths, science or sport.
Speaking on a visit to a free school in the south London borough of Lambeth yesterday, King’s College London Mathematics School, May said: “For too many children, a good school place remains out of reach with their options determined by where they live or how much money their parents have.
“Over the last six years we have overseen a revolution in our schools system and we have raised standards and opportunity, but there is much more to do.”
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: "The brutal and unacceptable truth is that for far too many children in ordinary working class families, the chance they have in life is determined by where they live or how much money their parents have."
But Labour's Shadow Education Secretary Angela Rayner said that she was "disgusted" at the new money for grammars which was a "vanity project" - with no evidence that it would help less well off children.
She told Radio 4's Today programme that it was an “ideological attack on the working class people of this country”.
And Jeremy Corbyn said the Tories were "barking up the wrong tree completely" with the new plans and said more funding needed to be put into supporting the struggling existing schools.
He told the BBC: "There is no great public support for selection, because they realise if you have selection for one group of people, somebody else doesn't get selected."
The half a billion pound package will also pay for the public transport costs or specially laid on minibuses for kids from struggling families to go to grammar schools that are between two and fifteen miles from their homes.
The help will be made available to children on free school meals or whose parents claim the Maximum Working Tax Credit.
Currently, the entitlement is only available for children who go to non-selective schools.
Existing schools will also benefit from the PM’s new package, with £216million of it also going to bolster maintenance and refurbishment grants.
Chancellor Philip Hammond added: “Investing in education and skills is the single most important thing that we can do to equip our children for the future.
“We are not starting from scratch; we have protected the core schools budget, which stands at over £40 billion this year, and these announcements take the next steps in giving parents greater choice in finding a good school for their child, whatever their background.”
Teaching unions said the maintenance cash was only a drop in the ocean, as the National Audit Office recently claimed £6.7billion is needed to return all school buildings to a good condition.
Criticising the extra free schools as well, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers general secretary Dr Mary Bousted, said: “We urge the Government to rethink and increase the overall amount of funding for schools through the national funding formula to ensure that every child has the opportunity of a good education”.