Decision details

Proposed decision

      I.                  Agree a funding agreement between Kent County Council and Sir Roger Manwood’s School Trust be entered into to enable £2.1m (plus indexation) of developer contributions to be paid to the School as and when received by the Council.

    II.                  Authorise the Director of Education in consultation with the General Counsel to enter into any necessary contracts / agreements on behalf of the County Council.

   III.                  Authorise the Director of Education to be the nominated Authority Representative within the relevant agreements and to enter into variations as envisaged under the contracts.

Reason(s) for decision:

Background

Sir Roger Manwood’s School is a co-educational selective school in Sandwich. In 2015 the School’s Trustees increased the Published Admissions Number from 120 places per year group to 150 and has been self-funding remodelling of the School’s buildings to accommodate the additional pupils.

The Authority has not provided any funding from its Capital Programme to support the expansion of the School.  To date financial support has been limited to £285k of developer contributions which the Authority received and passed on to the School to pay for works undertaken as part of its expansion. 

The School has a master plan in place which demonstrates how it will continue to remodel its facilities to address the pressure points created by admitting additional pupils.  The plans demonstrate three phases of works. 

Dover District has seen secondary school rolls rising for several years.   In the non-selective sector this increase has been absorbed within existing capacity.  However, in the selective sector Dover Girls’ Grammar School, Dover Grammar School for Boys and Sir Roger Manwood’s School have all increased their Published Admissions Numbers and have admitted further pupils.  Consequently, the Authority’s forecasts (Figure 1) indicate only a small deficit of Year 7 places in forthcoming years.  This would not be the case had Sir Roger Manwood’s not increased by 1FE.

Figure 1: Secondary - Year 7 surplus/deficit capacity if no further action is taken

Financial Implications

The Authority has sought developer contributions to support the School’s expansion from 4FE to 5FE, with agreements in place to the value of £2.1m.  In line with the CIL Regulations that applied at the time, these contributions name the School and can only be used to support expansion here.  They also refer to phases of delivery, again because the CIL Regulations at the time restricted the Authority to utilising no more than five obligations to a project. 

The Authority has not provided any funding from its Capital Programme to support the expansion of the School.  To date financial support has been limited to £285k of developer contributions which the Authority received and passed on to the School to pay for works undertaken as part of its expansion. 

As of November 2022, KCC has £741k of banked developer contributions which name Sir Roger Manwood’s School and the projects which support the expansion from 4FE to 5FE.

It would be appropriate to enter into a funding agreement for total £2.1m of developer contributions. This will set out the individual development agreements from which funding has been received or is anticipated.  It will stipulate the monies, and any indexation received with these, will only be paid to the School if and when received by the Authority.  This will not place any financial pressure on the Capital Budget.

As Cabinet Member for Cabinet Member for Education and Skills, I agree to:

I.        A funding agreement between Kent County Council and Sir Roger Manwood’s School Trust be entered into to enable £2.1m (plus indexation) of developer contributions to be paid to the School as and when received by the Council.

II.       Authorise the Director of Education in consultation with the General Counsel to enter into any necessary contracts / agreements on behalf of the County Council.

III.      Authorise the Director of Education to be the nominated Authority Representative within the relevant agreements and to enter into variations as envisaged under the contracts.