Education Minister Gillian Keegan said a ‘reserve’ of portable cabins had been prepared after more than 100 schools were ordered to close completely or partially close because of the crumbling concrete crisis, according to Express.
Education minister Gillian Keegan said that a “reserve of portacabins” had been made ready in order to substitute potentially dangerous ruined concrete schools for pupils. Being underpressure the minister claimed Kay Burley on Sky News today: “We have eight structural surveying firms, who go in and do the surveys.
“We have three suppliers of portacabin, so we’ve booked a stock of portacabins, so that people can be prepared quickly to do that if they need temporary accommodation. We’ve also looked at a propping company, so we have a propping company that’s nationwide. The Department of Education will pay for all of that”.
Kay Burley raised an issue about foundation of repair work and the source of its funding. According to Ms. Keegan, the Department for Education would fund all “mitigation work”. The majority of schools continue working and the “vast majority of children will be going back today”.
There appeared some concerns about Raac – a lightweight concrete used up until the mid-1990s – in public buildings were raised in 2018. It produced accusations that ministers did not act fast enough. Experts have cautioned that the risks may spread over all schools and hospitals, court buildings and prisons, where the material was used. Ms Keegan pointed out there will be some schools “with quite extensive Raac” and that they “may close so that we can put temporary accommodation in place”. She said:
“Many schools are either looking for alternative accommodation, if they are in a multi-academy trust, or within a local authority, or moving to another classroom if they’ve got a spare classroom. If it’s across the whole school, then that gets more difficult, so what we are doing right now is we have assigned a caseworker for each one of the schools, who are working with the school to figure out what the mitigation plans are. We want to minimize disruption to children’s education”.
Later there appeared a report of the Education Secretary telling BBC Breakfast that there were “104 (schools) that are not mitigated that are being mitigated right now”. According to her report, their status changed to crucial after a case happened in August where a panel fell from a roof. However, that incident was assessed previously as non-critical.
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt attempted to ensure parents the Government would “spend what it takes” to fix the problem Treasury sources later claimed the Department for Education’s (DfE) existing capital budget would grant money for repairs. Shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson claimed “the Department for Education was in “complete chaos” and “ministers need to get a grip”.
Earlier there was an information that there was a huge problem in school education in Britain because of the crucial conditions of school buildings and governmental policy on this issue. RAAC concrete safety measures could see schools closed until 2024 as portacabins and marquees are shipped in to replace crumbling classrooms and pupils return to lockdown learning.
