Sunday 15 May 2022 12:43 PM Officials say schools in England are in such a state of disrepair that they are ... trends now
Many of England's school buildings are in such a bad state that they have been deemed a 'risk to life', senior officials have warned.
Those working for education secretary Nadhim Zahawi have warned that the current pace of 50 school rebuilding projects per year needs to be upped to more than 300.
They have called upon the Treasury to make £13billion available to make this happen, as well as having emailed Downing Street to raise the alarm on two occasions in the last six weeks.
According to documents leaked to the Observer, an email from the Department for Education as part of a weekly update to No 10 on 30 March told of how the 'crumbling' school buildings were considered an 'upcoming risk'.
It read: 'School buildings: the deteriorating condition of the school estate continues to be a risk, with condition funding flat for financial year 2022-23, some sites a risk-to-life, too many costly and energy-inefficient repairs rather than rebuilds, and rebuild demand x3 supply.
Many of England's school buildings are in such a bad state that they have been deemed a 'risk to life', with senior officials warning that the current pace of 50 rebuilding projects must be upped to more than 300. Pictured, the Department for Education building in London
'Department for Education continues to engage Her Majesty's Treasury to expand the School Rebuilding Programme by a similar amount, as discussed in Spending Review negotiations.
'This includes increasing the number of School Rebuilding Programme projects a year from 50, to over 300.'
The same email also states that the Department for Education is 'battling' with the Treasury for £13billion to spend on school building repairs. The billions were made available as a result of recent reforms to higher education.
The second alarm was raised on 4 April when the same warnings of the schools being a 'risk to life' were repeated, also asking to increase
