Jeremy Hunt insists ministers acted fast on crumbling schools crisis despite warnings years ago

Chancellor denies austerity cuts to investment in schools were to blame

The chancellor has insisted ministers acted on crumbling schools at risk of collapse as they were told of dangers, despite evidence the government was warned years ago.

Jeremy Hunt on Sunday denied that the government’s austerity programme was to blame for the state of the buildings, while Labour accused the Tories of “negligence”.

More than 100 schools are facing the closure of buildings constructed from potentially dangerous aerated concrete panels ahead of the start of term this week.

Other public buildings such as hospitals and courts are also thought to be at risk, while the number of schools affected may also increase as checks are carried out.

Asked whether he accepted that decisions to cut back public investment were to blame, Mr Hunt said: “No”, though he said the last government had “run out of money” and left the incoming administration with “difficult decisions”.

“The moment we found out there were problems, we’ve acted on them,” he told the BBC.

One of the first acts of David Cameron’s government in 2010 was to cancel Gordon Brown’s Building Schools for the Future programme, which was meant to renew the school estate.

Asked whether suggestions that as many as 7,000 schools might be affected were accurate, Mr Hunt said: “I don’t want to speculate on these numbers, because I think that might scare people unnecessarily.”

The chancellor said he would “spend what it takes” to make the schools safe.

On Sunday a whistleblower at the Department for Education who worked in the private office of Nadhim Zahawi, then education secretary, claimed regular alerts crossed ministers’ desks.

They told the Observer that ministers and special advisers were “trying to get away with spending as little as they could” and that they had seen at least four detailed warnings about “reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete” in the space of a few months in early 2022.

Meanwhile, the i newspaper reports that the Department for Education was warned four years ago by structural engineers that schools built from the concrete could collapse without warning.

Parts of some schools have been taped off (PA)

Mr Hunt told the BBC: “We went through this exhaustive survey of 22,000 schools after the initial incident in 2018 [when the roof of a primary school in Kent collapsed].

“Then, in the summer months, new information came to light that suggested that some of the buildings that have previously been classified as safe might not be, and so the education secretary acted immediately on that: it was 156 schools.

“Measures were taken for a third of them, 52 of them, which meant that they were able to operate completely as normal. The other 100, the majority are still able to function face to face.”

Children’s commissioner Rachel de Souza welcomed the funding pledge but said: “We shouldn’t even have been in this situation.”

She told the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme: “There should have been planning in place and a really good school building programme that has addressed this over the years.

“Is it really the least to ask to say that we want safe, fit-for-purpose buildings? There’s not enough money in there and it’s not moving quick enough.”

Labour said the government needed to be up-front and release the full list of schools affected. But the opposition declined to commit to more money to fix the problem.

A taped-off section inside Parks Primary School in Leicester (PA Wire)

“We had a plan, they scrapped it. Had they pressed ahead we wouldn’t be having this conversation. That’s the reality,” shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson told the same programme.

Asked why she would not commit to spending for rebuilding schools, she said: “Because we face a really difficult situation around the economy.”

She added: “The public finances are in a terrible state. The next Labour government, if we form a government, will face a really tall order, but I am confident that we will put education right back at the heart of the ambition that we have for Britain.”

A spokesperson for the Department for Education said: “We have been clear since Thursday about the number of schools immediately impacted by RAAC. It is vital that schools are given time to inform parents and consider their next steps, with extensive support from our caseworkers, before the list of affected schools is published. The education secretary will inform parliament next week of the plan to keep parents and the public updated on the issue.

“Fifty-two of the 156 RAAC cases identified already have mitigations in place, and while some of the remaining projects will be more complex, many will range from just a single building on a wider estate, down to a single classroom.

“We are incredibly grateful to school and college leaders for their work with us at pace to make sure that where children are affected, disruption is kept to a minimum, and in the even rarer cases where remote learning is required, it is for a matter of days not weeks.”