---

Education and Inspections Bill

The local authority can act only in very specific circumstances relating to other education or children’s services’ uses for the lands. The noble Lord asked whether that other use could include the creation of a completely new school, fulfilling the local authority’s duties to permit diversity and choice. My understanding is that where the local authority formed the view that such a new provision was in the local public interest, it would be a legitimate reason for it to seek to act. Could others seek to oblige it to do so? The could do so indirectly through the provisions in the opening clauses of the Bill, which require local authorities to have regard to the promotion of choice, diversity and to take full account of parental demands, but they could not refer proposals to the adjudicator. It is important to understand why. We are talking about school sites. There has to be some overriding public interest for the rights of trustees or the governors of schools to be overridden in the decisions that they wish to take about the disposal of sites which are legitimately theirs.