What are surplus places and why do we need to get rid of them?
Surplus places occur where a school has more pupil places than the number of pupils attending the school. The Department for Education and Skills (DfES) expects authorities to take action if surplus places exceed 10%; otherwise money for educating children is being spent on cleaning and maintaining spare classrooms. Cheshire will have too high a level of surplus places in the next five years unless action is taken to remove them. The OFSTED report on the LA required the Council to take action to remove the surplus places.
