Half of school districts face places crunch - CPC Director comments on BBC Radio 5 Live

CPC Director, Professor Jane Falkingham, was invited to comment on the shortage of places facing many schools in coming years.

The discussion, which took place on 3 September with Phil Williams on Radio 5 Live, considered the affects of rising birth rates in the squeeze on school places, and the difficulties local authorities face in being able to accurately predict services.

Professor Falkingham commented: "It's an unusual spike we're going through at the moment. The last time we saw this level was the 1960s. We've seen an increase in the number of births year on year since 2001."

However, discussing the ability of local authorities to predict school spaces required, Professor Falkingham was cautious:

"It's slightly more complicated - people don't necessarily stay where they are born. So we know how many people are born in the country as a whole, and we have good estimates of where they are born from local authorities but, of course, not everyone stays where they start off."

Asked whether the birth rates will continue to rise, Professor Falkingham doesn't think so:

"Part of the reason we've seen this rise in fertility is that we've seen a trend over time for women to be putting off having children; we've seen a rise in people having children in their late twenties and early thirties. Now what we're seeing is that the next generation are starting to have their children in their twenties, so we've actually got a combination of people who are currently in their twenties having kids, and people currently in their thirties having kids."

She continues: "Of course, those women in their twenties who have had their children, when they get to their thirties, they probably won't have more still. So, we'll probably see a slow down in the birth rate just as we've built all these extra classrooms!"

Professor Falkingham finishes: "It's a cycle: we saw it in the 1960s and in the 1940s after the end of the Second World War, there was again a big spike in the birth rate which again was equivalent to one extra classroom in every school."

You can listen to the full discussion on the BBC Radio 5 Live website (from 19:56). The full news story is available on the BBC website.

Posted 04/09/2013 11:36