Establishing Oxford as a centre of growth, driven by groundbreaking businesses and research, is now a long-term government ambition.

Investment is already flowing in and for a long time now so have people, from both home and abroad.

It is all very well to rejoice in the prospects for the local economy, jobs creation and city’s reputation as a magnet for talent, but the rapid increase in population brings its own challenges.

The pressure on Oxford’s primary schools has been acute, faced both with ever-increasing numbers of children and the need to meet parents’ first choices.

And the pressure on Oxfordshire County Council to keep pace providing additional primary school places has also been intense for five or more years.

About £23m has been spent on school expansions in Oxford from 2011 to 2015, with 1,500 new primary school places expected to be created in Oxford over that time-frame.

The county council has gone about the complicated and costly task resolutely, with the scale of the projects complicated by the need to undertake thorough consultation with school heads and parents.

For it should not be forgotten that primary schools, and parents of pupils, cannot be relied upon to welcome significant numbers of pupils if it means loss of playing areas, traffic problems and reductions in extra-curriculum activities for example.

With news of planning applications submitted to expand Windmill Primary School in Headington and Wolvercote Primary School in Headington, extra places will be created at two of the city’s most in- demand primary schools.

However, every indication suggests across the city, and other parts of the county such as Banbury, the demand for school places is not going to level off in the years, if not decades, ahead.

County council leader Ian Hudspeth has already raised the spectre of youngsters again having to be taught in temporary classroom.

It is to be hoped County Hall is successful in its talks with the Department for Education, to ensure that adequate funding is made available to allow further school expansions three years from now and beyond.

It is all very well having City Deals, free movement of workers in Europe and planning inspectors insisting on more housing in council Local Plans, but investment in schools must be part of the investment in Oxford.

It would be a shameful prospect indeed if we were to have new billion pound science hubs and business parks opening everywhere as Oxford’s state school pupils were receiving their first education in overcrowded schools or ‘temporary’ classrooms.