Where are the extra school places coming from?

Cllr Bramble: “Options are extremely limited”

Hackney will need an extra 1,650 places by 2020, according to council projections, which the Town Hall says is equivalent to two more secondary schools.

Whilst free schools can provide many of these places, they will not able to provide enough in time.

Cross-subsidising schools with cash raised from new-build housing is one possible solution the council has come up with in response to the shortage of both homes and school places – however it has led to accusations that the Town Hall is “selling off” community assets (i.e. land).

Cross-subsidy has been used in London for several years through what are known as Section 106 agreements.

Under such agreements, new buildings or facilities (e.g. new schools) can be paid for with money raised through the building of, for example, housing developments.

This has already been done elsewhere in London: Netley Primary in Camden leveraged local property values for a cross subsidy project.

However in Hackney such projects have not fared so well. The Holy Trinity School in Dalston was denied a housing cross-subsidy put forward in 2013.

Side by Side School in Stoke Newington is still awaiting approval for its cross subsidy proposals.

Inigo Woolf, chief executive at London Diocese Board for Schools which oversaw Holy Trinity’s bid, praised cross-subsidy schemes: “One of the benefits of mixed use developments is that we have been able to invest in better facilities than would have been the case if we had been constrained by the guidelines issued by the education funding agency.”

Parents say no

Meanwhile, parents have criticised council plans to relocate and rebuild two primary schools to make room for a new secondary one.

Benthal and Nightingale primary schools in Hackney Downs could be redeveloped as mixed-use developments including both schools and housing schemes, funded through the sale of private flats.

Nightingale School parent Christine Murray has launched a petition against the plans, saying they do not include affordable housing or homes for social rent.

Responding to the outcry over the decision to fund school places by building flats on top of the schools, Cllr Anntoinette Bramble, Cabinet Member for Children’s Services said: “There is no other way to ensure we have enough school places.

“Over the last decade Hackney has benefited from one of the biggest and most ambitious schools building and regeneration programmes in the country. However, Hackney is feeling the impact of an increasing population on our schools.”

In an interview with the Hackney Citizen earlier this year, Councillor Rick Muir said the council will need to take advantage of land values to open new local authority schools.

“The financial pressures are new. But I guess we live in unusual times. The council is having to think in a new way about how it uses the land that it owns,” he said.

Cllr Muir has asked the council to “rethink” plans for the Nightingale Primary site on Tiger Way.

“I’m concerned this scheme to finance school places is coming up with buildings that are taller than residents on the estate want,” he said.

Cllr Muir claimed the council’s goal should be to aim high – although, she adds, “in terms of affordable housing, not in terms
of height”.

Despite this, the council is adamant that cross-subsidy is the best way to create more school places.

“Our options to fund them – and land to build on – are extremely limited,” admitted Cllr Bramble.

“We are less able to rely on government grants, leaving us with a funding gap of over £40m. By co-locating housing and schools, we will be able to build new schools and rebuild and expand existing ones.”