YSGOL Penweddig costs Ceredigion taxpayers more than £14,000 per school day, documents seen by the Cambrian News reveal.

Invoices show that in the 2016/17 financial year, including VAT, Ceredigion County Council paid almost £2.7m to the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) company responsible for financing and operating the Aberystwyth Welsh-medium secondary school, which was constructed in 1999.

Over the same period, there were 190 school days in Ceredigion, meaning the county’s taxpayers forked out £14,168 per day for the school.

It was revealed in the Cambrian News in February that the school, which has just under 600 pupils, would cost the council £58.8m when the final payment is made in 2030/31, despite the capital value of the school being just £12m.

Under the agreement, the council pays Newschools (Penweddig) Limited, the named holding company for the PFI, in monthly instalments.

In the 2016/17 financial year, this included a payment of £219,852.19 in April; £246,310.87 in May; four monthly payments of £213,548.86 between June and September; £194,372.39 in October; £213,548.86 in November; and four monthly payments of £239,028.66 between December and March.

The PFI bill does not include the provision of teachers or teaching materials, which the county council must pay for on top of the monthly repayments.

Cllr Alun Lloyd Jones, a long-standing critic of PFI agreements, said: “I think it is horrendous. A nightmare. It is unbelievable.

“There are people in the council who are paid good money to look carefully and thoroughly at this sort of thing.

“That [£2.7m] would keep several Bodlondebs open.”

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