The new Progressive Alliance leading Milton Keynes Council is proposing to spend £10m to improve community school buildings across Milton Keynes. 

Cllr Zoe Nolan, Labour Progressive Alliance Cabinet Member for Children and Families, will be proposing that MK Council invests over £10m in the coming years to improve community school buildings. 

The money will be spent keeping community school buildings in good repair. It will also be used to upgrade many buildings to reduce carbon emissions to help meet MK Council’s climate target of being carbon neutral by 2030, the most ambitious climate change target of any local authority in the UK. 

While MK schools will benefit from the new cash last week a national report highlighted school buildings in England require over £11bn of repairs to bring them up to an acceptable standard, with £1.7bn needed in the South East alone. 

Many other councils in England, mainly Conservative controlled county councils, have made cuts to repair budgets for community schools, while central government funding cuts to academies, who must fund their own repairs, mean many have not been able to afford to maintain their buildings. MK Council has consistently bucked that trend. 

Cllr Nolan will formally take the decision on 8^th June. 

Cllr Zoe Nolan, Labour Progressive Alliance Cabinet Member for Children and Families said: “The Progressive Alliance is committed to ensuring every child has the best education, and that starts with well-maintained school buildings.” 

She continued: “Our £10m spending on school buildings is an investment in our local children. It is also an investment in our future, as the funding will be used not only to fix buildings, but to make community schools more energy efficient in order to help us meet our carbon reduction targets.”  

She concluded: “The reality is that a decade of Conservative government means schools across England are falling apart, with the funding needed to meet the repair bill more than doubling over the past few years. However, unlike Tory councils and government cuts to academies, here in MK the Progressive Alliance-led council is investing millions in education.”