There is a lot of talk about an ageing population in the UK and the implications that this has for society and public services, yet, as new research suggests, this isn't the only age group that needs to be looked after.

Policymakers should also be looking hard at the infrastructure that underpins primary school education, the Local Government Association (LGA) has outlined.

For example, while efforts are being made to address the implications of an older population – there are currently ten million people in the UK over the age of 65 – how best to ensure that children get the best start to life seems to not be that high a priority.

There is, in short, a rapidly growing primary school population who face real challenges ahead of them. The expansion of this demographic is something that needs to be catered for, says the LGA.

According to the study by the "national voice of local government", primary schools in England are facing no choice but to play host to oversized classrooms.

While councils created 900,000 places in 2013, a further 130,000 are needed by 2017 to get things back on track.

The difficulty is that local authorities have finances to consider – the Local Government association explains that councils are attempting to "plug a national black hole" of at least £1 billion.

There is a knock-on effect of this. Appreciating the importance of ensuring that all youngsters get a place at a primary school, councillors have had to cut back on spending.

As such, finances have been redirected from school maintenance projects and even essential building works to boost primary school places.

However, while this is working for now, it cannot be sustained. Moreover, it is clearly not a sensible approach to what could end up being a crisis.

The LGA found that three-quarters of respondents to its survey were of the opinion that central government funding to generate extra school places between 2011/12 and 2016/17 has been insufficient.

Councillor David Simmonds, chairman of the LGA's Children and Young People's Board, said that it is normal for parents to be confident that their children are able to secure a place at a "good local school".

While this is true for many mums and dads, it is coming at a devastating cost to the council. Although government funding is welcome, he continued, it has not been appropriately financed.

"The scale of this black hole is such that the cost of the creation of new school places cannot be met by council taxpayers," Mr Simmonds added.

"The underfunding of free school meals pales in comparison to this but both show that the government's rhetoric must be matched by its chequebook, rather than leaving local authorities to pick up the tab."

He went on to say that this problem is not just evident in primary schools. In fact, secondary schools across the country are also experiencing problems in delivering an appropriate level of school places.

"Councils face a challenge to create places on time and in the right areas, in a climate where they are also short of money to do so," the councillor expanded.

"Additionally, much of the decision making about new school places rests in the hands of the government, whose funding for school places came too late."

So bad are finances, that some councils have had to find cash from elsewhere. For example, the LGA's research revealed that 38 per cent had borrowed money, 22 per cent sourced money from building programmes and 67 per cent accessed money from developers.

Responding to the news, education minister Nick Gibb explained that the government is doing all that it can to "remedy the problems that were caused by failing to prepare for this baby boom by the previous government".

Speaking to BBC Radio 4's Today programme, he said: "We are providing significant sums of capital at a time when across Whitehall we have had to make very significant savings in order to tackle the budget deficit."