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Almost one in 10 pupils in England is studying in schools that require rebuilding or refurbishment following years of under-investment, according to the UK’s public spending watchdog.
The National Audit Office warned on Wednesday that the condition of English school buildings was “declining” after a decade in which funding for repairs and reconstruction was less than half the amount requested by the Department for Education from the Treasury.
The NAO said in its report that the lack of cash also meant the government had failed to cut the risk of a fatal school building failure or collapse, which the DfE has rated as “critical and very likely” on the official national risk register since summer 2021.
The watchdog also probed the steps taken by the DfE to curb the dangers posed by asbestos and a lightweight type of concrete used in school construction between the 1950s and mid-1990s that it said was “prone to failure”.
The findings — which follow analysis by the Financial Times showing the proportion of English schools allocated government funding for repairs fell to an all-time low this year — prompted anger from teaching unions.
Kevin Courtney, joint general secretary of the National Education Union, said capital funding for schools had declined by roughly 37 per cent in cash terms and 50 per cent in real terms between 2009-10 and 2021-22.
“With the school estate in such a perilous condition, and the need for investment in retrofitting never more compelling, the arguments for categorically and demonstrably reversing this trend remain potent,” he said.
Overall, the NAO estimated that 700,000 of the 8.4mn students in English state schools were studying in poor quality buildings, which the DfE believes has a negative impact on pupil performance levels and teacher retention.
The DfE has said it needs £7bn for “best practice” in school repairs and maintenance, but in 2020 it asked the Treasury for funding of £5.3bn a year and was given an average of £3.1bn a year between 2021 and 2025. Between 2016 and 2022, the department spent an average of £2.3bn a year on maintaining the school estate.
Courtney said the DfE remained “woefully behind” in gathering the information required to fully manage the potential risks from lightweight concrete.
The NAO said the DfE had identified the presence of the potentially defective concrete in 572 of 21,600 schools in England and completed 96 investigations by May 2023, with the building material confirmed in 65 schools.
Patrick Roach, general secretary of teachers’ union NASUWT, accused the government of “fiddling whilst schools crumble” and gambling with children’s health and safety.
“As each month passes, the fabric and safety of our schools estate continues to deteriorate as the impact of 13 years of policy failure and woeful levels of under-investment by the government grows,” he said.
The NAO also found that more than one-third of the 1,000 schools deemed most in need of remedial work by the DfE had not applied for the department’s latest rebuilding programme.
Its report also warned that inflationary risks and instability in the construction sector meant ministers were significantly behind on their initial forecasts for building new schools, with the DfE awarding 24 contracts by May this year compared with the 83 predicted in August 2021.
The DfE said “nothing is more important” than the safety of pupils and teachers and that it was investing in 500 projects for new and refurbished school buildings through its school rebuilding programme, with an additional £15bn allocated since 2015.
“It is the responsibility of those who run our schools – academy trusts, local authorities, and voluntary-aided school bodies – who speak to their schools’ day-to-day to manage the maintenance of their schools and to alert us if there is a concern with a building,” the department added.
