AN UPDATED business case for a new primary school building worth potentially over £11 million at Sennybridge near Brecon is now for a smaller development.
At a meeting of Powys County Council’s Liberal Democrat and Labour Cabinet on Tuesday, April 8, councillors received a report on the “revised outline business” case for the project which is part of £300 million programme of investment in schools over the next decade.
Councillors had been advised to invoke paragraph(s) 14 of Part 1 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972 to exclude the press and public from meeting as legal officers believe that information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person including the authority holding that information would be shared.
They believed that maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information.
Council leader, Cllr James Gibson-Watt (Liberal Demcrat) stressed that while the discussion would be confidential their decision would eventually be made public – a statement that said cabinet had agreed the proposal was released by the council later in the day.
The majority of councillors voted in favour of going into confidential session, however two councillors voted to keep the item in the public eye.
When the project was last before cabinet in September 2022 the proposal was for a new building to cater for 150 pupils – the latest version will now be for 120 pupils.
The overall cost of the project had risen from £10.2 million to £11.15 million with an expected 65 per cent of the funding, £7.25 million, to come from the former Welsh Government 21st Century Schools Fund now known as the Sustainable Communities for Learning Programme.
The remaining 35 per cent, £3.9 million, needed to be found by the council.
In recent months, the cabinet and senior council staff have reviewed school building projects and have changed their view on how to go about it.
Building new school’s is not the council’s default position anymore.
Extensions and remodelling of existing buildings will now be considered as well.
In February it was revealed that the council has decided to keep the exact amount of funding available for each school building project a secret.
This is because they fear that that people and companies who are aware of the “full budgets” for these schemes will submit tenders for that amount “rather” than what they believe it would actually cost to build.
