Someone at the Department of Education issued new advice today, one week before the opening of the new school year, ordering the closure of every school building in the country which incorporates Reinforced Autoclaved Aerated Concrete roofing material. It will be extremely inconvenient and disruptive. It is also rare instance of someone in authority taking a decisive step before another catastrophic construction failure occurs. Whoever forced that policy change through should get a knighthood and the nation's thanks. No council has done anything of the sort, and the continued use of the buildings for years to come before remediation would have been inevitable.
I don't think anyone in either local or central government can step back from this now it's been announced, and I don't believe any NHS hospital can keep any building open which has the same material problem. From today, the death of anyone in a collapse due to RAAC in a public building will be an immense scandal. Nobody can now say it couldn't have been predicted.
In an escalation of the schools building safety crisis, the Department of Education has issued new advice – believed to have happened as recently as Thursday – stating that regardless of the assessed risk of a building made using reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC) blocks, such buildings should be “taken out of use and mitigations should be implemented immediately”.
Official communications seen by the Guardian acknowledge that “this may come as a shock and is likely to cause disruption” but say “the safety of pupils, students and staff is our priority”.
The DfE declined to comment on claims that the number of schools with buildings using the problem material was above 100. The department is understood to be planning to make a statement imminently and education unions said they had been told that a formal announcement was due on Thursday afternoon.
https://www.theguardian.com/education/2 ... k-concrete
This is from the Condition of school buildings report of The National Audit Office
Since summer 2021, DfE has recognised the significant safety risk across the
school estate – its corporate risk register shows as ‘critical and very likely’ the risk
that building collapse or failure could cause death or injury. This would mean the
collapse of one or more buildings, causing serious harm alongside public concern
about the safety of schools, and widespread school closures or pupils being
withdrawn. DfE considers that insufficient capital funding to address structural
issues, and the condition of some buildings at the end of their initial design life,
contribute to the severity of the risk.
