Examination of Witnesses (Questions 40-59)
TIM BYLES
14 JULY 2008
Q40 Chairman: On behalf of members of
the Committee, I welcome the next witness, Tim Byles. Some of
us know that he has a passion for Shakespeare in schools, and
some of us know that he was formerly the chief executive of a
local authority in the eastern region. Welcome to our proceedings.
You have heard a lot of the previous session, and we are going
to give you a chance. You saw what was said in our report, which
was not badly received when it came out. You heard from the evidence
that Ty, Richard and the Barnsley people were giving that not
all the criticisms in our report have been answered. Where are
we with BSF, from where you are sitting?
Tim Byles: Thank you, Chairman.
I am glad to be in front of the Committee again and to have the
opportunity to brief you on the progress in the programme since
I last gave evidence, back in December 2006.
Q41 Chairman: You had just been appointed,
had you not?
Tim Byles: Indeed. I was just
about to refer to that. It was a particular pleasure, if a bracing
one. I had been in the job for only five weeks when I appeared
last time, and quite a lot has happened since. I would like to
take the opportunity to mention some of it. As you will see from
the short handout that we have circulated, when I arrived at Partnerships
for Schools in November 2006, two local authorities had been through
the procurement process and selected a private sector partner.
Today, that number stands at 21. Then, a few early quick-win schools
had opened their doors; today, we have 13 open, with that number
set to be more than double this autumn and rise to about 200 schools
per annum in the next few years. Some 80 of the 150 top-tier authorities
are now in the programme, and about 1,000 schools are somewhere
between design and delivery in BSF. So there has been significant
progress since I was last here. Indeed, 2007-08 was the first
financial year in which PfS met or exceeded all its delivery targets.
I am confident that we are on track to repeat that progress this
year, after a slow start in BSF, which was the subject of much
of our discussion last time. Clearly, success should not be measured
just in terms of deals done or bricks and mortar. When I arrived
at PfS, much of the public scrutiny of the programme had focused
purely on its time scales. It was welcome to have a discussion
in the Committee, and read in your report, about having a focus
on quality as well and recognising the potential of the programme
to help transform life chances for millions of young people. As
the delivery agency for BSF and for academies, it is the job of
Partnerships for Schools to ensure that the programme delivers
on time and on budget. We are on track to do that, but it is more
important that the programme delivers on its ultimate objective,
which is to help transform educational delivery for every young
person, no matter what their background. That focus on quality
is what has driven a number of changes that we have made to the
processes that help to deliver BSF, and it is helpful to think
about those in three parts. There is a difference between early
projects, which are often focused on in BSF, and those that are
going through the system now. If I may, I shall mention two or
three changes that we have introduced. First, on pre-procurement,
we have tried to make sure that the vision of the local authority
is sufficiently ambitious and bold, and that the local authority
is ready to hit the ground running early, on entry to the programme.
You heard from the previous witnesses about some issues in early
procurement, where the procurement process was being used as a
means of refining the objectives of the programme. Those pre-procurement
changes have improved the time by up to 30% for local authorities—a
reduction of nearly six months through starting earlier and being
better prepared. Secondly, on procurement, we have streamlined
the process within EU requirements, which will deliver significant
savings to BSF at a programme level—up to £250 million.
That will help to ensure that the market is vibrant and that there
are enough players to compete, in order to deliver a value-for-money
solution. Thirdly, we are now engaged in a review of the operational
phase, checking and challenging how local education partnerships
are operating in practice, and how they are delivering value for
money to the public purse. Those three changes have secured some
significant reductions in the delivery timetable—up to eight
months in total—and cost savings. I am more encouraged,
however, because they provide a much better platform with which
to ensure that BSF delivers learning environments in which every
young person can do their best and can reach for excellence. We
are already starting to see tangible results from that through
independent review work. The National Foundation for Educational
Research has conducted some research on Bristol Brunel academy,
our first local education partnership-delivered school, which
has given tangible and significant improvements in attendance,
aspirations and staying-on rates. We are seeing good results on
refurbishment schemes as well. For example, in Sunderland, the
Oxclose School has already seen an improvement on GCSE results,
from 24% of pupils attaining A to C grades in GCSEs, including
English and maths, up to 41% last summer, and the forecast is
that that will exceed to 50% this summer. The last point that
I would like to mention in these opening remarks is to highlight
the importance that we give to learning lessons, gathering lessons
learned, and sharing them in the BSF community. We have increased
our activity on that front significantly over the last 20 months:
introducing a national learning network for BSF; re-launching
our website, with dedicated spaces for learning from experience,
from which e-mail alerts are issued to the BSF community as new
lessons are learned; a quarterly publication sent to all local
authorities and the private sector, highlighting learning and
experience; a comprehensive calendar of conferences, including
sector-specific ones on ICT and design already this year; and
we have started a programme of BSF open days, where local authorities
and the private sector will be invited to a new BSF school, to
hear direct from the partners involved in delivery, the challenges
and issues that they face. The first one is to take place in the
Michael Tippett school in Lambeth this autumn, a school that I
think you visited recently, Chairman. Finally, for the avoidance
of doubt, there is to be a post-occupancy evaluation of every
BSF school, as we announced earlier this year. The gathering of
that kind of information is important for the sharing of best
practice—what has worked and what has worked less well.
I am very keen that we do that. When I gave evidence to the Committee
back in 2006, I made it clear then that we would continue to learn
throughout BSF. That is still my firm belief. It is about helping
to transform lives, and we at BSF will continue to work with and
challenge local authorities, the private sector partners and ourselves,
to do our best to ensure that we make the most of this opportunity.
Chairman: Let us start by drilling down
on the procurement process.
Q42 Mr Carswell: I have a couple
of questions. There is a massive amount of expenditure, putting
a lot of our money on to the balance sheet of a few big corporations.
Some people say that when it comes to defence procurement, a few
small contractors have got the process rigged in their favour.
Is that happening with this? Are there a few lucky ones who put
all that public money on to their balance sheets because there
are barriers to entry?
Tim Byles: No, that is not true
of BSF. We currently have 21 active bidding consortiums into BSF
and we have three new entrants coming into the market at the moment.
An issue for us, as we think about the way in which the programme
rolls out, is how to balance the breadth of market activity with
the capacity and ability to learn. We are not seeing the reduction
that some other programmes have seen. You mentioned defence, and
health is another example where there is quite quickly a consolidation
down to a small number of consortiums. That has not been the case
so far in BSF.
Q43 Mr Carswell: How can that be?
If you constrain the supplier in any market, the seller sets the
terms of trade. PricewaterhouseCoopers did a report that, for
example, allowed for more comprehensive pre-qualification for
bidding consortiums, and more focus on effective partnering issues.
Those are all barriers to entry, are they not?
Tim Byles: I do not think so.
We have been careful to try to ensure that they are not barriers
to entry. What is interesting is that, since the launch and approval
of the procurement review, we have seen three new entrants. A
range of factors influences activity in the market. Success is
one—we have seen some people moving in and out—and
the balance of the consortium is a second, but we are certainly
not seeing a reduction on the basis of that activity.
Q44 Mr Carswell: Do you have any
data, which we could perhaps make available afterwards, that would
show exactly how the money had been spent—where the direct
recipients are and what range of businesses are getting a share
of the market?
Tim Byles: Yes, we can certainly
publish, and do publish, the successful consortiums by local authority
area, as they achieve success in BSF. There is not a problem in
making that available. We also publish the scale of activity earlier
in the process. The process begins with a number of bidders expressing
an interest. There is then a shortlisting down to three and then
two bidders, prior to the real competition, as it were. There
is no shortage of information around, in relation to the market.
Q45 Mr Carswell: In order to squeeze
better value for money out of every tax pound spent, is there
anything that you would like actively to do now that would expand
the range of bidders—I am not talking about what has happened,
but going forward—perhaps even letting in small contractors
who would not get a bite of the cherry?
Tim Byles: Yes, I am keen to find
ways in which small and medium-sized enterprises, as well as a
large consortium, can participate in BSF. We are already seeing
that through the supply chain and through the relationships with
the larger consortiums. We are also seeing a number of middle-sized
builders and contractors leading the smaller schemes. There is
quite a large range in the size of projects in BSF, from £80
million up to £1.5 billion. It is not a one-size-fits-all
approach here. What we are trying to do is to balance the access
with value for money, and with delivery and improvement of efficiency
through time. The Department for Children, Schools and Families
has just concluded a consultation on the second half of BSF—2007
to 2015—where we are looking at opportunities just like
the ones you mention, for other entrants to bid on more targeted,
smaller-scale schemes.
Q46 Mr Carswell: So, if a smaller
business came to me and said that they found that they had barriers
to entry, I could bring them to you and we could work out what
those barriers to entry were and how to remove them?
Tim Byles: You certainly could.
As I said, a number of smaller contractors are participating very
effectively in BSF, with the flexibility that they bring. There
is a need to balance value for money overall with flexibility
and pace, which is often what they bring.
Q47 Mr Carswell: The second thing
on which I would be interested in your views—we looked at
this earlier—is the idea of national guidelines for the
design of schools locally. I am very conscious of that. This is
more to get your thoughts. In the '60s and '70s everyone thought
tower blocks were a good thing, and then—someone talked
about leaky roofs earlier—flat roofs were everything. Today,
although I will probably be hung, drawn and quartered for saying
it, the fad of the moment is carbon neutrality—we may or
may not be talking about that in 20 years' time. Now there is
this great trend to make schools into some sort of community centre—that
may or may not work. Even though people talk about flexibility
and you can change the size and shape of the classroom, the fact
is that there are certain preconceptions about what a school is
going to be and what it is going to do. Is there not a certain
danger in having national guidelines? Would there not be a smarter
way of doing this, which would be somehow to allow different localities
to do their own thing, giving them the freedom to develop?
Tim Byles: I think that the issue
from my perspective is to try and get the balance right between
having some national standards, which build on experience across
the country, and giving local flexibility to make choices that
are available to the very different settings in which these schools
are located. Some local authorities have a local vision that sets
their BSF school in the context of a much wider economic regeneration
strategy, for example. Some others want to see schools as more
stand-alone elements of the community spread across a large county,
for example. Both of those are fine, as far as BSF is concerned.
What is not fine is if we were to try and create a situation where
there was overcrowding or inadequate facilities against some measures
where we are clear that we want to stimulate learning, which is
why every BSF school is an extended school. That is not a one-size-fits-all
measure. It allows that extension to fit with the locally owned
strategy—as it does in Essex, for example—and to fit
more broadly with the local delivery of the gathering of services.
Those might be social care services or wider education services
as the children's plan envisages; but there is a great deal to
be learned in a world that needs to be increasingly flexible.
So we are trying to create places that are effective in today's
technology and that have the flexibility to adapt through time.
We want to check that progress with the users as well as the parents,
teachers and communities in which these schools sit. I am very
keen that we do not have a one-size-fits-all approach and that
we learn lessons for where they are working—because there
are some similarities across communities and there are experiments
going on in what is the best way to deliver some aspects of learning
in a modern environment.
Q48 Mr Carswell: One final question.
Would you allow a school that says it is not going to have any
access to any community activity, is going to go to the other
extreme, is not going to worry too much about this carbon neutral
stuff and is going to maybe emulate what the Victorians did? Would
you allow that? That would be flexible.
Tim Byles: It would be flexible,
wouldn't it? No; on sustainability we would not, because there
are some national guidelines. To pick up on some points that were
made before I sat down here, BSF was not high on the sustainability
agenda when it began. The Government clarified the position in
relation to sustainability last year through the introduction
of a 60% reduction in carbon footprint for new BSF schools. We
are on a trajectory via a taskforce that I know you have heard
about this afternoon to get to carbon neutral schools by 2016.
So there are some national standards that local schools need to
take into account, but the dimensions of the extended school is
very much a discussion that we have with each local authority—and,
indeed, each school—to try to set a balance and pattern
of service into what is a much larger and more complex service
environment locally.
Mr Slaughter: Are we going on to educational
sustainability?
Chairman: You can go on with anything
you like.
Q49 Mr Slaughter: What has begun
to interest me about the programme, which I suppose naively I
originally thought was simply a modernisation and capital programme—there
is nothing wrong with that at all—is how it can be used
to change the whole educational approach of a local education
authority. But that can be quite a political process. I am going
to give you a parochial example, but it may have a wider significance;
however, before I come on to it, are you aware of that? If there
is a political agenda coming to you from local authorities in
the way that they wish to spend these very considerable sums of
money, are you alive to that and are you responding in a political
way, or are you simply ticking a lot of boxes to see whether the
money is being spent in a proper way?
Tim Byles: I am certainly not
responding in a political way. I am responding to the different
perspectives and priorities that local areas have—and they
are different, across the country. There are some givens about
the national programme. It is about raising standards comprehensively,
and agreeing locally through a strategy for change process—which
is the shorthand we have for capturing the local education strategy
and the estate strategy in a form that does drive up standards
and is in the interests of every young person within a local authority
area. You are right; that sounds deceptively simple. There are
issues about boundaries and the migration of pupils; about diversity
and choice; and about the extent to which some local authorities
want to gather wider services on and around school sites. That
differs, but what we are trying to have—and that I believe
we are developing—is an intelligent dialogue about the aspirations
of the Government, which I am there to represent, and the aspirations
of the local authority and the leader and chief executive of the
council, with whom we deal, as well as the director of children's
services. That is why, for each BSF school, as we begin them,
I visit the authority and speak to the leadership—political
and official—and we reach an agreement, which is quite a
formal agreement, about the process that will be gone through
in order to deliver the educational changes locally. I hope that
that answers your question.
Q50 Mr Slaughter: Well, it allows
me to introduce my example, which is one of my local authorities,
Hammersmith and Fulham. Briefly, there are four principles that
I see in the BSF programme, which they are just putting forward
to Partnerships for Schools as we speak, almost. One is the downgrading
of community schools and the original proposal to amalgamate three
community schools in a 16-form entry, which sounded quite bizarre.
The second is to expand faith schools, even though they are over-represented
already in the local school economy. The third is a massive expansion
in sixth forms, but with no resources going to the one successful
sixth-form college in the area, and a lot of the money therefore
going to the building of those sixth forms—up to seven new
or expanded sixth forms—within a small local authority area
over a five-year period. Finally, there is the use of the money
to dispose of assets to the independent sector in order to set
up independent schools. None of those principles accords with
what I would necessarily want to see as a use for Government money.
I thought it was for improving school standards overall, but particularly
for community schools with a high percentage of free-school-meals
pupils that, although they were improving greatly, were not doing
so well. Taking that as a hypothetical example, how would you
respond?
Tim Byles: It sounds very hypothetical.
I cannot comment on the absolute detail of that scheme, although
I would be happy to talk to you separately about it. I will just
look at some of the items that you have raised. We are not at
all interested in the downgrading of community schools. We are
interested in trying to ensure good access and good choice for
every young person across the local authority area. We recently
had the remit meeting, so we have commenced a process for the
strategy for change that allows for further development. We have
not agreed every item in it as yet. There was an eight-week process
at the beginning and a 20-week process for the second part of
the strategy for change. That will allow us to reach an agreement—or,
indeed, a disagreement: if there is disagreement, the project
will not proceed—about fair access and good opportunities
for all young people. As for the hypothetical expansion of faith
schools, we looked in quite a lot of detail at the pupil place
numbers and the expected pupil places for each local authority
area. That is a science, but it is also an art, particularly in
London and especially in places like Hammersmith and Fulham, which
have a large percentage of resident pupils who are educated outside
the borough. We are trying to look at it in the broader sub-regional
context in order to reach conclusions. If there is good evidence
that we need more places in faith schools, we are capable of agreement
on that, although I do not know in this specific case. On the
expansion of sixth forms, we will be looking at the track record
and delivery of existing institutions as well as any plans for
new sixth-form places. The disposal of assets is generally a matter
for the local authority, although there is a relationship between
the disposal of school assets and the contribution that local
authorities need to make towards the programme more generally
in their areas. All those points are ones that I would expect
to agree with any hypothetical Hammersmith and Fulham over this
period of the strategy for change process. Those are the principles
that we will look at, and we have started a process that will
debate them and bring them to a conclusion before the project
proceeds in earnest.
Q51 Mr Slaughter: To conclude, even
though you would obviously not be looking at this from a political
point of view, let alone a party political point of view, if issues
raised in that way appeared to you not to be achieving the objectives
of the programme, would you at least question them?
Tim Byles: Yes. If they were not
achieving the objectives of the programme, we would not allow
them to proceed. It is normally the case that in the pre-engagement
and early engagement phases we are sufficiently clear about the
parameters that we are dealing with, and if not, we tend not to
start the process. I am hopeful that we will reach a positive
conclusion in Hammersmith and Fulham, but I do not have available
this afternoon the detailed points that you make.
Mr Slaughter: I would be happy to supply
them.
Q52 Chairman: Keeping on that point,
if we interviewed the Learning and Skills Council and other players,
such as the Association of Colleges and so on, about the transition
of two years, and the dramatically changed shape of the LSC, they
would say that because of you lot in Building Schools for the
Future, and because of the academies programme—because of
the world that they live in, in terms of planning their future—you
are encouraging local authorities to plan for the future across
the piece, to have a vision, yet at the same time they, especially
the further education sector, will say, "How can we plan
anything?". How can the local authority plan anything, with
trust schools and academies both having the potential for sixth
forms, with Building Schools for the Future allowing sixth forms
in their new build? It is a crazy kind of environment. Who is
doing the planning? How can order be brought to that chaos?
Tim Byles: I think there is order.
I think that order is coming. Through the strategy for change
process we are trying to take into account 14 to 19 provision,
locate the education strategy within the broader community strategy
that the local authority holds for the whole area, and for that
to cover zero to 19 and beyond. We are working with the Learning
and Skills Council in London, looking specifically at the joins
between vocational opportunities, academic sixth-form opportunities
and the rest of the secondary school agenda, in order to overcome
that kind of issue and to ensure that things are connected. A
single document should set out clearly what a local authority
wants to achieve in a broader context in its community strategy.
Within the strategy for change it says, "Here are the places
that we need for this local authority, here is the mix between
vocational and academic opportunities and here are the specific
linkages." Each school has a strategy for change, as well
as the local authority. We increasingly want to share vocational
and academic resources between institutions in the locality, through
clusters, federations or simply through the operation of expertise
in adjacent areas. That is happening more and more, and it is
a key principle of BSF to look after everybody's needs for an
authority, not just for our own purposes, but for good planning
generally to cover diversity and choice issues, efficiency and
value for money.
Q53 Chairman: So how do you look
down and look up? You are mainly at secondary level. Do you look
down to the primary level and say, "What is the quality of
new build going on outside the BSF programme?" What about
the environmental standards that Graham mentioned just now? Do
you look up to the FE sector? When we did the last inquiry on
BSF we were told that 50% of that estate had been rebuilt, often
not to the high standards that BSF hopes to achieve, and certainly
not in terms of environmental standards and carbon footprint.
Is your good practice spilling over, down or up?
Tim Byles: It is starting to.
I do not claim that we have this solved—we do not. We have
an agreement to look at the whole picture in terms of pupil numbers.
Increasing numbers of local authorities use their local education
partnership as a means to procure and deliver primary schools
through the primary programme. We are making the connection at
the strategy for change level with further education and on to
higher education. We are responsible for the delivery of BSF.
We do not run the primary programme. We are increasingly looking
for ways to join that process up and we work actively with the
Department for Children, Schools and Families to find better ways
of doing so. This year we will see clearer linkages emerging and
I hope that we will be able to deliver linkages beyond the strategy
level with FE provision. We must allow the circulation of pupils
between FE and sixth-form provision, which we already see in several
strategy for change proposals. Blackpool is an example that springs
to mind where we consciously have a programme that does exactly
that. It allows the movement of pupils between an FE college and
the seven secondary schools within the borough.
Q54 Chairman: Tim, you have been
chief executive of a big local authority. We have taken evidence
from local authorities and visited them. Taking on a big BSF strategy
is demanding on resources, time and staffing. At the same time,
the Government are throwing open the careers service and the funding
of further education, and piling on the number of things that
local authorities can deliver. Do they have the capacity to do
that?
Tim Byles: When I was a local
authority chief executive I was keen to have as much devolved
to me as possible. In the report, I notice that you talk about
the need to get that balance right. That needs to be judged carefully
in terms of capacity and capability. In relation to BSF and the
academies programme, there is a wider variation in capability
and capacity in local authorities, which is why we try to tune
our relationship accordingly. Some need more help and challenge
than others, and some have a more comprehensive picture of where
they want to go and how they will resource it than others. I am
keen for authorities to have a programme for BSF that delivers
effectively and is located within a broader strategy. I do not
make an assessment of the Government's devolution of other schemes
to them.
Q55 Annette Brooke: If we could look
at some of the issues that came up in the previous session—you
probably heard the answers. There was a question about whether
there was enough post-evaluation, and you covered that in your
introduction for obvious reasons. Could you tell us a little more
about the post- evaluation that is taking place? Is it looking
at all those issues of involving stakeholders, or indeed at energy
measurement? In other words, is it going beyond value for money
for the taxpayer? I feel there are a lot of dimensions that should
be looked at.
Tim Byles: You are exactly right.
There are a lot of dimensions. There is a sort of technical process.
When people use the term post-occupancy evaluation, sometimes
that is restricted to a very technical evaluation by technical
assessors of the physical characteristics of the building. I am
talking in a much broader sense. I am very keen that we use objective
research information to plot our progress and to challenge us
to develop further, as well as being clear about the ingredients
that we can spread as best practice across the country. So we
look at stakeholder research. For example, Ipsos MORI has carried
out quite a widespread exercise for us this year, which we published
on our website, that talks about stakeholder involvement; that
was an issue that your report raised last year. It measures the
extent of satisfaction and participation by parents, teachers
and young people in the process. I will not go through all the
details for you, but there has been a very significant shift over
the last 18 months in the attitudes and perceptions of involvement
among stakeholders, and the recognition that the programme needs
to be seen as a whole programme—ICT, building and education
transformation, all together. For example, 65% of stakeholders
say that the amount of contact that they have with Partnerships
for Schools is about right; 85% of stakeholders say that ICT is
an integral part of the programme, and local authorities have
a very high level indeed of favourable involvement at the preparation
stage for BSF. So we have been checking across the stakeholder
community. We have also been talking to students and head teachers.
The National Foundation for Educational Research report on Bristol
Brunel Academy, which I mentioned earlier, gave some very specific
details, for example about reductions in bullying, feelings of
safety when at school, and desire to stay on later. I would just
like to give you one or two statistics from that report. The figure
for those who feel safe at school at Bristol Brunel Academy most
or all of the time increased from 57% to 87 % this year. Those
who felt proud of their school increased from 43% to 77%. Those
who said they enjoyed going to school increased from 50% to 61%.
Those who perceived that vandalism was at least a bit of a problem
decreased from 84% to 33%. Those who perceived that bullying was
a problem decreased from 39% to 16%. Those who expect to stay
on into the sixth form or to go on to the local further education
college increased from 64% to 77%. We feel that those kinds of
figures are significant measures of good progress at that particular
school, which is why I am keen to chart it in other areas, as
well as the academic and the sustainability points that you started
with.
Q56 Annette Brooke: My question in
the previous session was really whether Government were giving
sufficient leadership. On the face of it, it sounded as if the
Government were following; in other words, at individual authority
level, there was the bolt-on of environmental sustainability on
the transformation, which is a mix of local authority and central
Government. Apart from the money, however, what are you really
adding to the outcomes?
Tim Byles: There is quite a bit
from us. If I just start from the beginning, when people are starting
to plan their strategy for change process and starting to define
the educational improvement strategy for that area, we spend quite
a lot of time introducing resources that are not always available
within a local authority, particularly in pupil place planning
for example. It is very important for us that we have a view across
an authority's area of how many pupils you will have for the next
generation, in order to ensure that you have a good investment
that is not too many or indeed too few places. So there is quite
a lot of input in developing the education strategy. There is
quite a lot of input in the early stage about the facilities available
through ICT across the curriculum. As part of our single gateway,
which was another of your recommendations that the Government
have picked up, we manage the contracts with 4ps for pre-engagement
work for capacity building and project management skills in authorities,
with the Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment
in order to challenge and support good design as the process proceeds,
and with the National College for School Leadership, which is
there to ensure that head teachers and their leadership teams
understand what it means to lead a project through BSF. So there
is quite a bit at the early stage. When it comes to going out
to the market and engaging with the private sector, holding bidder
days and starting to develop the strategy to run through what
is a complex EU procurement process, we have expert project directors
who are allocated to each local authority to help both to guide
and to challenge that process within the local authority to the
point of financial close. When the arrangement is concluded, we
have, through our sister organisation, Building Schools for the
Future investments, a place on the board of the operational local
educational partnerships to ensure that progress is sufficient
against the timetables that we have set. There is a significant
capacity constraint within local authorities in the project management
area and in the negotiation and skills area. We are seeing quite
a lot of movement between local authorities, so we are engaged
on our own account and with 4ps in developing training and wider
access to those skills so that there is sufficient out there to
help to manage BSF projects. We try to target and to provide our
services proportionately to the need of the local authority. We
do not want to overdo it. Equally, we want to make sure that there
is good progress in timing and quality for these projects.
Q57 Annette Brooke: It all sounds
quite mechanical, and I cannot see where the innovative ideas
have a chance to pop through the system. How is innovation being
encouraged?
Tim Byles: We want to encourage
innovation, and one way that we are finding helpful is through
the engagement of young people. We use the Sorrell Foundation,
through its joined-up design programme, to hold workshops, seminars
and programmes that help to stimulate new ideas direct from pupils
about what is important for the design of new schools. We encourage
each local authority to participate in that process. We are also
encouraging the design community to innovate in the way in which
it produces proposals for design, and for the bidding consortium
to do so as it approaches a local authority to enter into the
procurement process. I would not describe that as a mechanical
process, but it is a complex process. At its core, local authorities
must choose a partner who will be able to respond to their aspirations
locally, to deliver something that is flexible enough to respond
in different local settings even within a single local authority
area, to have a good relationship with the schools and communities
in which they are located, and to deliver something that is effective
and provides value for money on the ground.
Chairman: We are running out of time.
Paul wants to go back to something that we missed out, but need
for the record. We can then get Graham to wind up.
Q58 Paul Holmes: What are the lessons—this
is partly connected with what you have just been talking about—from
the one-school pathfinders?
Tim Byles: A number. We feel that
it is most effective to make investments in schools in the context
of the strategy we talked about before—overall, a strategy
for change. You can go in and look at a school that has a particular
need and sort it out in the individual school. Unless that sits
in a broader strategy, the investment, if replicated too widely,
would not provide the optimum solution. One-school pathfinders
have allowed areas throughout the country, where there are high-need
local situations, to produce new facilities quickly. It is better
to do so in a broader way that fits with the overall strategy.
That is my conclusion. We also need to make sure that the same
rigour on design, sustainability and value for money applies to
every investment across BSF. Some of the early one-school pathfinders
did not score as highly as the schemes that are coming through
now.
Q59 Paul Holmes: I was going to ask
about that. Some of the early stories were horror stories about
individual schools being taken to the cleaners by the PFI contractor,
who might say, "Well, if you want these extra school activities
in the evenings and at weekends, you will have to pay extra for
them, and we will charge you for car parking and so on."
That goes against the whole point of improving and extending school
facilities. Are you saying that we have learned the lessons from
that by doing whole-authority negotiations?
Tim Byles: Yes. That is important.
There are two or three points to make on that. First, it was not
just a function of one-school pathfinders. It was an issue historically
with single-school PFI, which caused a range of problems on flexibility
and value for money. However, there are some good examples of
single-school PFIs which do not have those problems, so it is
not just an issue in kind. The Jo Richardson community school
in Barking and Dagenham is a good example of a flexible arrangement
with a PFI provider. The maintenance and facilities management
arrangements are managed by the school to a very high degree of
value for money and flexibility through the introduction of vocational
space, new special needs provision and so on. It can be done,
but it is much more difficult on a single-school basis. That is
why looking at the rest of the estate is so important. What is
unique about the local education partnership approach—I
speak as someone who, in my previous life, was quite critical
of the problems of PFI in its early years—is that it is
in the business interest of the consortium to both be flexible
and deliver value for money. Otherwise, they lose the exclusivity
for the period, which is given by the local authority and could
be for ten years. The value for money has to increase year on
year on a like-for-like basis, or the exclusivity is lost. That
is the first time that I have seen PFI working in the explicit
interests of the public sector as well as the private sector,
and needing to demonstrate that flexibility. Each one of our first
several schools coming through the second and third wave of procurement
in BSF is hitting its value for money improvements. We monitor
that on an individual school basis as well as in phases and waves
in BSF. Were those improvements not to be delivered, we would
go to an alternative source to provide the schools in a local
authority area.
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