A new primary school will only open in Shinfield if there is demand for school places in coming years, Wokingham Borough Council has said.
Plans unveiled in October showed land at Church Lane and Hyde End Road in Spencer’s Wood could be built on to provide a one-form entry primary school.
It would be able to take on up to 210 pupils, with sports facilities, a hall and play areas and wider community uses to be considered.
The proposal comes as Shinfield faces an ‘emerging shortfall in provision for all age groups’, with a likely shortage of places to come to light by 2025.
This was partly due to high levels of housebuilding in the area, last month’s executive report said.
But the scheme for the new primary school would only move forward ‘once there is a need for it’, the executive member for children’s services Prue Bray said.
Councillor Rohit Ahlawat asked at the full council meeting last night (November 21) for clarification on this, and when residents can expect the school to open.
Councillor Bray confirmed it would be ‘delivered within five years’, but that this was ‘subject to the materialisation of additional pupil demand in the area’.
Across the Wokingham Borough, there is a decline in demand for primary school places and a simultaneous ‘bulge’ in secondary-school aged children.
The greatest rise in demand has been for year 7 places, which is partly due to migration into the borough.
But a decline in birth rates in recent years means that there are less children filling primary schools.
Councillor Bray explained at the full council meeting: “It is therefore critical that we balance the ambition to provide sufficient local places with the need to ensure that additional surplus places are not introduced in an education system where schools are already struggling to fulfil their roles with associated financial pressures.”
She said the council would be ‘informed by actual demand’ and evidence.
Concerns were also raised by Councillor Charles Margetts over the emerging shortfall of secondary school capacity.
The executive member for children’s services assured colleagues that more provision was being secured for higher age groups, including the sixth-form extension of Bohunt school in Arborfield.
This project has faced delays – with construction costs pushing the original opening of September 2023 back three years.
It will have capacity for 300 sixth form students, many of whom currently travel outside the borough for their post-16 education.
