Free Schools: Denton

(asked on 17th May 2022) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether he has made an assessment of the potential merits of establishing a new secondary Free School to serve Denton to increase parental choice in the area.


Answered by
Robin Walker Portrait
Robin Walker
This question was answered on 24th May 2022

Section 14 of the Education Act 1996 places the duty on local authorities to ensure that there are sufficient primary and secondary school places in their area. This is with a view to providing diversity in the provision of schools and increasing opportunities for parental choice. Where a school is an academy and wishes to make changes, including increasing the number of pupils, the academy will follow the department’s published guidance for making significant changes.

Where there is forecast growth in demand and a shortfall of places in an area, the Local Authority will meet this future demand, such as by expanding existing schools.

The Schools White Paper also confirmed our intention to seek proposals for new mainstream free schools in areas with the greatest need for more additional places, prioritising proposals in Priority Education Investment Areas such as Tameside. The department will set out further detail on the application process in due course. Separately, where a local authority thinks there is a demographic need for a new school in its area, it must seek proposals to establish a new free school.

In 2021, 85.1% of pupils were offered their first-choice secondary school in Tameside and 94.5% received offers from one of their top three choices. This compares to the national average where 81.1% of pupils were offered their first choice secondary school and 93.4% received offers from one of their top three choices.

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