Still under a PFI contract until 2031, the longer the building stands the more it will cost us in PFI payments plus cancellation fees. This is a classic scenario where inappropriate planning permission can be granted easily to offset the huge costs.
I'm more annoyed with Northern Schools Trust, they took the academy on knowing the costs and just turned round and dumped it putting the costs back onto the public.
It shows the failings of Government backed PFI and Academy programs, they are not cost effective, they are high risk and generally they under-perform. Some of the many ways the Government transfers money from the people to the rich.
We don't do charity in Germany, we pay taxes. Charity is a failure of governments' responsibilities - Henning Wehn
Digging does that mean it could be demolished or sold as building land. People in the area are concerned that it will just be abandoned & left to deteriorate.
Its unlikely to be re-used as a non-council school mainly because its a PFI building and the associated cost.
The Council could take it over and run it as a state school, perhaps in partnership with someone but any partner will know the Council has its back against the wall and won't be offering a brilliant deal.
The PFI bill (over half a million a year) has now fallen to the Council to pay who are hoping the Government will pick up the tab but there is not a huge chance of that, the Government puts money towards schools, not empty schools.
That leaves the option of demolishing the building and letting developers do what they want with the land so that the Council can get some money to offset the huge cost of the PFI contract and hope for a reasonable price for an early PFI termination.
The Council will be looking at the options but considering the financial pressure they are already under it will be a money dumping decision.
The absolute last option is to leave it empty and be a complete financial burden to the Council similar to what Speke did at Parklands High which was costing £12,000 a DAY (about £90m over two years) to keep closed. Fortunately Kingsway's location is a bit more desirable to developers than Parklands.
We don't do charity in Germany, we pay taxes. Charity is a failure of governments' responsibilities - Henning Wehn
If there was an opportunity to sell it to a private developer and therefore for the council to bolster their council tax income then this would probably be the way to go.
Similarly they'll be allowing development on greenfield imminently.
If the council get some money out of this,perhaps they could use it to fund some extra classrooms at Clare Mount as they have had a bigger intake of year 7 & more year 11 decided to stay on for 6th form.They were informed the council had no money for this so the 6th form kids have to use the CLC next to the Wallasey school for some of their lessons.
