The north east batch is worth £120m and comprises a dozen schools, including two first schools – Hetton School in Sunderland and Mandale Mill Primary School in Stockton on Tees.

Contractors are being asked to design, build, finance and maintain the schools over a period of 25 years.

Funding will be provided through the Government’s PF2 aggregator model which will see a single organisation provide debt funding for contractors.

A bidders day was held last month to outline the plans and now firms have until the end of this month to complete the prequalification process.

The last day for requests for the documents and for queries to be raised is midday on 27 August.

For further details email: [email protected]

The move follows the invitation to tender for the first £150m tranche of privately-financed schools in Hertfordshire, Luton and Reading.

A further three batches covering covering a dozen schools North West (£93m); seven schools in Yorkshire (£97m) and eight schools in the Midlands (£122m) will come up for bid within the next 12 months.