Building For Schools

[CB Saint]

I have just read that three councils are seeking a judicial review to try to overturn the decision to cancel building work for schools.

 

Now whether or not you agree with the decision, it seems to me plain daft in this era of cuts to spend taxpayers money suing a body, who will use taxpayers money to defend themselves, to ensure that taxpayers money gets spent.

 

Surely the councils realise that if they get this overturned then they will have the £55bn taken off them in some other way.

[badgerx16]

True, but there will always be somebody looking to get their 15 minutes in the spotlight. Politicians and common sense - mutually exclusive.

[Doctoroncall]

Are they seeking a review or suing? You have said both.

 

Personally, education is one area that shouldn't be cut, but that's not to say there should be carte blanche spending - money spent needs to be made more effective.

[Special K]

It's more a statement of objection to the cuts, i think. The main problems with the BSF scheme was the procurement method used for the construction, the wasteful use of Consultants who all run around trying to blame each other for inefficenient design and cost planning, the use of medicore Contractors who had spent a lot of their profit on the bidding process and not to mention the New Labour legacy of a "loadsamoney" programme where overspends were commonplace but absorbed by the public purse when it could cope with it. Obviously this is now brought into sharper focus.

 

BSF produced some good projects, but also many more failed, costly, delayed and inadequate schools that do nothing for the community they are supposed to serve.

 

BSF needed to be scrapped, but it needs to be replaced with something more streamlined, more efficient and more accountable. Hordes of consultants who are employed but provide very little to schemes need to be sent packing. Contractors need to be more accountable and not hide behind others faults and produce sensible tenders. Books need to be open and everyone needs to be focused on the same goal. I hope that something is announced this week at the Tory PC that will meet this.

[bridge too far]

Special K - as someone who has audited many BSF schemes, can I make a couple of observations?

 

The initial bidding process is a bit long-winded but it should be remembered that the schemes are often in phases. One major city's BSF that I looked at involved 13 schools in total. In order to deliver each school fit for purpose, that meant 13 lots of headteachers, school governors, parents and representative children had to be involved in the process. Without 'stakeholder' (I hate that term) involvement, the delivered school might not work. Also many of the schemes involved the NHS Primary Care Trusts. However, once the schemes were agreed in principle, the next steps were quite quick.

 

Most of the schemes were, in essence, PFI schemes (with Local Education Partnerships setting up JVs with the successful contractor). Although I'm against PFI in principle, most PFI schemes deliver on budget and generally on time. Often a Guaranteed Maximum Price is agreed leading to a 'Pain / Gain' deal.

 

There have been some poor projects, as there have been in traditionally procured projects. But there have been some superb ones too.

[Special K]

The whole procurement process was far too long winded and cumbersome. Why involvement from everyone from a headteacher to little Johnny from 3C is required is beyond me? The stakeholders (i dislike this too!) were generally only paid lip service anyway, but to raise expectations of their involvement broadly led to diluted stewardship from the start. A large %age of schemes were just late - i think of the 200 to be completed and occupied by the end of 2008, only 37 were finished. OK, there as an improvement in 2009, but BSF as a rule didn't really work as it should.

 

There is no question that investment in school buildings is an absolute necessity, i just hope this Govnt can simplify the process, be realistic about the costs and sensible on the timing.

[benjii]

BSF is renowned, even in the PFI world, as being unduly cumbersome.

[bridge too far]

BSF is renowned, even in the PFI world, as being unduly cumbersome.

 

Mainly because most agreements are for phases of schools and not just one.

 

And, from my experience of a scheme with 13 schools, it's not just the buildings but the whole infrastructure including city wide IT schemes that link in to the city's central system and into the NHS systems too. It usually involves hard and soft FM being devolved to the JV partner and these contracts are incredibly complicated.

 

If it takes a single PFI hospital roughly 8 years to deliver from strategic context to handover, it's not surprising that multiple buildings would take a fairly lengthy time to complete.

 

Some people think BSF is for a single school. It's not.

[Chin Strain]

.....

[Deppo]

.....

 

Nutshell.

[trousers]

Nutshell.

 

This

[latter day saint]

This

Ditto