Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to ease the pressure of rising birth rates on schools.

Local authorities are responsible for planning and securing sufficient school places in their area. Supporting local authorities to create school places where they are needed most is one of the Department for Education’s main priorities. That is why we have committed £5 billion in capital funding between 2011 and 2015 to help local authorities to create new school places. In addition we have announced an additional £2.35 billion in capital funding to help create new school places that will be needed by September 2017.

This support has already enabled local authorities to create 260,000 additional pupil places between May 2010 and May 2013, including 212,000 primary places, with more in the pipeline for September 2015. We have also stripped out bureaucracy to make it easier for schools to expand to offer more places, if they so wish.