Schools are paying over the odds for everyday items under PFI deals (Dreamstime)
Schools across England are paying thousands of pounds for everyday items because they are locked into expensive PFI contracts.
A report in The Times claimed that some schools were paying up to £8,000 for items such as window blinds due to the crippling rates charged.
A survey by the Times Educational Supplement has revealed that one school now pays £132,478 to its PFI company annually, while Bristol Metropolitan Academy will pay £8,154 for the fitting of a single blind in one of its rooms.
The charges are often labeled as “life-cycle costs” that schools will be charged over the duration of the PFI contracts.
Stella Creasy, Labour MP for Walthamstow, in north-east London, said that companies that profit from financing PFI deals were the “legal loan sharks of the public sector”. She has called for an inquiry into PFI “before even more schools and hospitals are saddled with debts they can’t pay”.
Concern over the lack of value for money in PFI deals has prompted the National Audit Office to start an investigation into schools.
Before the general election was announced, the inquiry was expected to be completed by summer but its conclusion has been deferred.
Funding has become a big issue as schools are under increasing pressure to make billions of pounds in savings. Under a new national funding formula about 10,000 schools face budget cuts next September.
