A CONTROVERSIAL public-private partnership is to spend £60m on five schools on Teesside.

Redcar and Cleveland Borough Council has this week been given permission by the Government to proceed with the programme.

A private contractor, yet to be chosen by the council, will design and build the schools, with building work due to start in the summer of 2004.

Mindful of recent controversy surrounding Public Finance Initiative (PFI) hospitals, the council is stressing that it has learned from mistakes made by health trusts.

The scheme, financed by £48.9m of private money and a 100 per cent grant for work on voluntary aided schools, will cost a total of £60m.

Split into seven main schemes, work will include three secondary school buildings for Sacred Heart RC in Redcar and two community schools for Bydales, Marske and Gillbrook Technology College, South Bank.

Due to falling pupil numbers, some primary schools will be amalgamated and the extra money will fund new buildings. They are St Albans and St Dominic's in Redcar and Beech Grove and Cromwell Road in South Bank.

Two secondary schools - Laurence Jackson, in Guisborough, and Nunthorpe - will also be extensively remodelled.

Councillor Ian Jeffrey, the council's lead member for lifelong learning, said: "We are aware that PFI hospitals have had difficulties and I share some of the public's concerns over them.

"But we have learned from their mistakes and private involvement is now a reality. And in terms of getting that amount of money to improve our schools, there is no alternative."

The council had already won approval for the scheme from the Department of Education and Skills, and now the authority's outline business case has been endorsed by the Government.

Coun Jeffrey said: "We have seen evidence that pupils learn better in modern, clean, spacious environments. There is nothing worse that teaching and learning in old, dark buildings with structural faults.

"The plans for amalgamated schools reflect the demographics of the Tees Valley and the North-East in general, where people are leaving to look for jobs in the South-East."

The council will choose a private contractor in the next 12 months and it is hoped the new and improved schools will open by September 2006.