To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Science how far his recent announcement of capital allocation meets the backlog in repairs and maintenance of schools.

Between 1986–87 and 1989–90, local education authorities spent over £2 billion on school buildings. We have provided a further £1.8 billion worth of annual capital guidelines and grant to local education authorities and governors of voluntary-aided schools since 1990–91. This will have done much to remedy the deficiencies noted in the 1986 survey of school buildings.