Burnham boosts cash to solve FE capacity crisis 

Projections suggest thousands of extra places will be needed for 17 and 18-year-olds in the next three years

Projections suggest thousands of extra places will be needed for 17 and 18-year-olds in the next three years

Andy Burnham will use £10 million from his combined authority’s coffers to double the value of a special government grant to boost post-16 student capacity next year. 

The Greater Manchester mayor has approved plans to tackle the 16 to 19 population bulge that many major cities are facing. 

In April the government announced £10 million in capital funding for both Greater Manchester and Leeds to create “additional capacity” from September. 

According to a Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) report, the mayor will put forward £10 million in “recycled” local funding, amid concerns the government’s £10 million for 2025-26 is only a “partial” solution to population growth that is projected to continue until 2028. 

GMCA plans to use its own money to either “flexibly” top up Department for Education capital funding in later years or to pay for workforce and equipment needs. 

The authority will also give half of the post-16 funding to Manchester City Council, one of the region’s 10 boroughs, after identifying high demand for providers from learners travelling from elsewhere in the region. 

Meanwhile, Leeds City Council told FE Week it was “continuing to work” on how the funding will be spent locally and hoped to confirm plans “over the coming weeks”. 

What’s the problem? 

Most of England’s largest cities are under pressure to increase education places as the number of 16 and 17 year olds is projected to grow by 8 per cent, or 110,000, between 2023 and 2028. 

Leeds City Council told FE Week its projection for its own area was a rise from 18,000 in 2023 to 20,000 in 2028. 

In response, its schools, sixth forms and colleges have created 900 extra places in the last three years. 

But Colin Booth, chief executive of Leeds’ main college group Luminate, said the city “urgently needs” around 2,500 more places by 2028 to cover technical level 3 courses and “almost all” subject areas below level 3. 

Projections for Manchester suggest an estimated 6,000 to 7,000 extra education and training places will be needed “in coming years”, on top of the 2,000 places created by post-16 capacity funding in 2023-24. 

According to the GMCA report, those places “mostly focused” on level 3 provision in sixth forms such as A-levels, while technical education places at lower levels were “stretched to their limits”. 

Most for Manchester 

Greater Manchester said the “very welcome” £10 million from the government would likely be used for urgent “repurposing [of] existing facilities” or “converting unused space”. 

To decide which parts of the region funding goes to, officials have devised a formula that combines projected population change, numbers of young people not in education, employment or training, and “travel to learn” ratios between Greater Manchester boroughs. 

As a result, colleges in the Manchester City Council area will share £5 million, while providers in Salford will get £1.2 million. Other boroughs will receive as little as £224,000. 

The council appeared to win much of the funding after an analysis of its post-16 provision last year found it was about to run out of space. 

After raising the issue repeatedly with DfE officials since 2022, the city council had “no option” but to “formally” declare a gap in provision, in the hope this would persuade the department to fund about 2,000 extra places. 

The department had “no strategy, mechanism or funding” to address post-16 capacity issues in the same way as schools, Manchester City Council complained. 

Is £10 million enough? 

Leeds and Greater Manchester have welcomed the £10 million in capacity funding but other cities are understood to be facing similar population pressures. 

But both cities agree funding is needed beyond the DfE’s capital grant, which cannot pay for revenue elements like equipment or staff wages, and may not address continued population growth up to 2028. 

Leeds City Council said that while the extra £10 million was a “major boost” in filling the projected gap in physical spaces and learning environments, additional funding was needed for infrastructure and teaching “given the scale of provision required to meet demand in the city”. 

Nikki Davis, principal of Leeds College of Building, told FE Week: “It’s not just about creating space, recruitment of staff has been notoriously difficult for years.  

“Because of a lack of funding going in [to further education], rate rises are not keeping up with the costs of employment, so we’re not getting people into the industry.” 

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