£1.25 billion to include new primary school building for Dunoon, Kirn and St Mun’s
published this on 11:24 am, Thursday, 26th November, 2009Community News| Cowal | Comments (rss) | Respond | Ping |
The Scottish Government has just announced a new school building programme for Scotland which includes developments for Argyll and Bute.
A plan for 14 new secondary schools was announced in September – which will see over 12,000 pupils in modern classrooms and every local authority in Scotland benefiting in the first tranche of the new £1.25 billion programme.
Now the plan is to develop 20 primary school projects and one involving a new special school, benefiting a further 6,000 pupils.
In Argyle & Bute support has been agreed for a new school building project involving Dunoon , Kirn and St Mun’s Primary Schools. Argyll & Bute Council had submitted a proposal through the Government’s school building programme to amalgamate the three primary schools in Dunoon – Dunoon, Kirn and St Mun’s – into one new-build campus. This will now go ahead.
Education Secretary Fiona Hyslop says: ‘Today’s announcement means that every local authority in Scotland will benefit from our new £1.25bn school building programme, as we continue to reverse the trend of under investment and neglect in Scotland’s school estate seen in previous decades.
‘This Government inherited a legacy of 260,000 pupils in poor or bad condition school buildings and in just two and a half years that number has dropped by over 100,000. We are on track to deliver in excess of 250 new or refurbished schools in the lifetime of this Parliament through £2bn of investment already underway, supported by decisions made by the Scottish Government.
‘And in the space of two months we have announced additional support for around £700m of new investment in refurbishing and replacing 35 schools, which will see over 18,000 more young people learning in cutting-edge, modern classrooms’.
Welcoming the announcement, Argyll’s MSP, Ji Mather, says: ‘It is excellent news for Cowal that Dunoon Primary and Kirn Primary schools are to be part of this latest building project.
‘The pupils and staff, who use exciting state of the art methods of learning, which reach out to the surrounding community, will now have modern buildings in which to operate, having fulfilled the criteria to be part of New Schools for Scotland. A key factor here was the local authority’s readiness to proceed.
‘Dunoon and Kirn Primaries are part of the Scottish Government’s ongoing commitment, during these tough economic times, to delivering better schools for Scotland’s children.
‘We must look forward but also remember that Audit Scotland condemned the previous administration’s school building programme for failing to meet targets or to recognise which schools needed replacement.
‘The Scottish Futures Trust will develop, recommend and implement approaches that will secure a better schools programme across Scotland, and better value for money than could be achieved through each local authority working in isolation’.
Related Posts
The Latest News from ForArgyll delivered via email, weekly or daily. You know it makes sense!
Comments (rss) | Respond | Ping | | Print This Post
Loading...