Michael Gove promises £2bn for school buildings and IT

A £2bn privately-funded programme to build schools and provide them with IT and other equipment has been announced by education secretary Michael Gove. He said between 100 and 300 schools will be covered by the programme, with the first opening in September 2014. "This programme will be open to local authorities and schools that had been due funding via Building Schools for the Future but, critically, it will also be open to those, who despite real problems, had never been promised BSF funding," said Gove. Meanwhile, he promised a full survey of the schools estate, in line with the recommendations of the government-commissioned review by Sebastian James of Dixons Store Group, published in April. James said that standards of IT provision in schools vary widely and that many have not progressed beyond an ad hoc approach to funding and maintaining their technology. His recommendations included a separation of decisions about IT from those about buildings. This article is published by Guardian Professional. For updates on public sector IT, join the Government Computing Network here .