Colleges left 'crumbling' in £2.7bn funding fiasco

"Reckless" behaviour by civil servants has left London's further education colleges at risk of being unable to carry out more than £300million of desperately needed refurbishment, a report said today.

It lays bare the fiasco at the Learning and Skills Council, which - in just over a year - approved projects costing £2.7billion more than it could afford.

These included Lambeth College's £50million technology centre in Brixton. The project is stuck in limbo, with the college struggling for money after the LSC failed to honour its promises.

The report, from the Commons public accounts committee, said the LSC, which is due to be abolished next year, was guilty of a "very serious failure" in a £2billion programme to refurbish tertiary colleges across the UK.

Lambeth College was able to build a sixth-form centre in Clapham with £5million from the LSC. But there was no sign of the LSC's promised £50million for the project to rebuild its base in Brixton Hill. The site would have housed construction, engineering, electronics, media and computer-aided design facilities and increased the college's student roll from 7,000 to 8,000.

Peter Doble, Lambeth College's vice-principal for finance and planning, said the LSC encouraged it to demolish and rebuild the Brixton Hill site rather than opt for a cheaper refurbishment.

"There has been no prioritising of the capital spending [by the LSC]. It's been first come, first served," he said.

"We spent what spare resources we did have. We are now stuck with buildings which, in the case of Brixton, are virtually falling down. Had we known how it was going to pan out, we would have come up with different plans."

The public accounts committee found that colleges in London bidded for a total of £760million at the end of last year, but that the LSC could only afford £446million. There are 53 further education colleges in London and about 450 nationally.

Edward Leigh, the Conservative chairman of the committee, said: "The Learning and Skills Council has been guilty of a very serious failure in its management of the programme to refurbish and rebuild further education college buildings.

"The council behaved recklessly by approving too many projects and allowing colleges' expectations of financial support to outstrip what it could afford by nearly £2.7billion."

Business minister Pat McFadden said: "Since 2001 our building programme has rebuilt or renewed more than half the further education estate."