13 Nov 2006

The Interserve-led consortium Environments for Learning (E4L) has been named Proposed Preferred Bidder by Leeds City Council under the Building Schools for the Future (BSF) programme. Interserve's consortium partners are Mott MacDonald and Barclays Private Equity.

BSF is the single biggest government investment in improving school buildings for over 50 years. The aim is to rebuild or renew every secondary school in England over a 10 –15 year period, raising educational attainment, promoting good citizenship and engendering a sense of community.  Leeds, one of the largest Metropolitan District Councils in the country, is committed to ensuring that strong, effective schools are at the heart of its community and is set to transform its entire secondary school estate through the BSF initiative.

As part of this 10-year strategic partnership E4L will initially be delivering 14 schools with a capital works value of £220m. The first phase, consisting of four new schools under the private finance initiative and two refurbishments, will provide facilities for some 6,000 pupils and is due to be operational by September 2008.  Facilities management services, which will also be delivered by the consortium, will run over 25 years. As a result of the strategic partnership there will be potential for the E4L consortium to develop additional projects.

When final negotiations are completed E4L, as Private Sector Partner, will form and own jointly, with Leeds City Council and Partnerships for Schools, a Local Education Partnership (LEP) that will progress and deliver the Council's BSF programme – transforming the Leeds vision into reality.

"This is a tremendous opportunity to make a transformational change to the delivery of education for thousands of children in Leeds," commented Adrian Ringrose, Interserve's Chief Executive. "We have a great deal of experience in building and maintaining schools throughout the UK and we shall be using it to the full as we work alongside our consortium partners, the City Council and Partnerships for Schools to create some exceptional educational facilities."

Chris Edwards, chief executive of Education Leeds, said, "I'm delighted we've been able to select such a strong, creative and flexible partner for the BSF programme. E4L understand our priorities and their innovative, flexible designs will provide an excellent platform to transform secondary learning in Leeds.

"We have attracted over £450 million of investment in our school buildings, and we will continue to look for any ways to create brilliant learning places where all our children and young people can achieve brilliant outcomes."