Academy spent nearly a sixth of its income on PFI contract

Crawley town centre, in West Sussex. Source: Wikipedia.

A school spent nearly one sixth of its core income from the government last year on a private finance initiative contract, which seems to be yielding high returns for the company managing it, Education Uncovered can disclose.

Thomas Bennett Community College, in Crawley, West Sussex, spent £1.066m on PFI payments in 2016-17. This equated to 16 per cent of its core income from the government’s Education Funding Agency, and 14 per cent of its total spending for that year, a freedom of information response has revealed.

Thomas Bennett is part of one of England’s largest academy chains, the Kemnal Academies Trust (TKAT), which, as was revealed in the Observer in January, warned in its 2016-17 accounts of the pressures on its budgets.

Thomas Bennett, which is one of three Crawley secondaries which were constructed or rebuilt under a PFI contract instigated by the local authority in 2004, is listed in TKAT’s annual accounts as having a deficit for 2016-17 of £630,000, the second highest at any of TKAT’s 41 schools.