Dozens of schools that could be at risk of collapsing have reportedly been told they could be forced to close down at short notice if they’re not made safe.
Hundreds of schools across the nation were built with reinforced autoclave aerated concrete, known as RAAC, between the 1960s and 1990s, with the buildings having a life span of about 30 years.
The risk of the ‘crumbly’ concrete, which has previously been compared to a ‘chocolate Aero bar’, has been known for five years now, after a primary school in Kent partly collapsed but now chaos could be caused for thousands of more children.
Students face serious injury, or even death, at the hands of such decaying buildings that are long past their shelf life.
Documents from the Department of Education, seen by a newspaper outlet, reveal that schools impacted by the infrastructure need to prepare for the eventuality that they’re taken out of use and vacated at short notice until they’re made safe.
This could see pupils, many of whom have already had their schooling interrupted by several COVID-19 lockdowns, sent off to other schools, taught in alternative locations or forced to return to learning remotely online.
In June, a newspaper outlet reported that the total number of school buildings at risk was expected to increase significantly, referencing a Schools Week report that the DfE had told four schools, in Essex and the northeast, to shut after RAAC was discovered in their ceilings.
The report stated that Mistley Norman Church of England primary school and Hockley primary school, both in Essex, were named, along with two schools in the northeast run by the Bishop Bewick Catholic education trust.
School bosses are now being urged to come up with a plan, after being asked ‘what it would take to implement a plan ahead of the start of term’.
A report by the National Audit Office (NAO) earlier this year revealed that 700,000 children in England attend schools requiring major repairs, with more than a third of buildings being beyond their lifespan.
The watchdog said it would be focusing on the 14,000 schools that were built during the time when RAAC was used in construction.
By May, 65 out of 196 schools inspected were confirmed to have used RAAC. An additional 400 were due to be checked out of the 600 potentially impacted.
So, our schools collapse and many of our OAPs starve, yet the Tories can afford to house men, women and children who have no legal right to be here. They also seem to be able to pay some civil servants six-figure salaries, and they can afford to demolish our economy with the net zero carbon nonsense.
Honestly, if the Victorians could see us now, they’d be turning in their graves. The United Kingdom was once a proud history of industrial culture, and if this wasn’t so serious, it would be a joke.
How is it that the Victorians built schools that are still functional today, but late 20th-century architects used materials they knew would fail within their lifetime?
The point is the schools are falling apart and so is our country. What are they going to do about it, absolutely nothing. They’ll just huff and puff until the schools fall down. Moan and groan!
They clearly erected these schools with the intention of saving money, but now it’s going to cost a lot more to rebuild them.
THE MONTHLY MOSQUITO 