Rishi Sunak’s government is under intense pressure to act as the crumbling concrete crisis leaves Britain’s schools in a state of disarray just as the new academic year gets underway, with more than 100 institutions forced to shut either partially or entirely over safety concerns.
Education secretary Gillian Keegan has provoked further ire by telling school leaders to “get off their backsides” and address the structural problems their institutions face from the historic use of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (Raac) in their construction, a material now considered unsafe, while headteachers have accused the government of “dumping” them with the issue after years of neglect.
