Fury as Tories block call for advice PM was given over RAAC to be released

06 September 2023 , 18:07

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Rishi Sunak is accused of ignoring official advice about crumbling schools (Image: AP)

Tory MPs have voted to keep advice given to Rishi Sunak about crumbling schools secret.

The Government faced calls to release all written advice sent to Mr Sunak when he was Chancellor and PM about the dangers of reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC). Labour demanded to see documents sent by the Department for Education (DfE) ahead of spending reviews in 2020 and 2021, as well as the 2022 spring and autumn statements.

It follows claims the PM opted to reject advice over dangerous buildings. Shadow Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson told MPs: "Today's debate quite simply is about responsibility, and whether the Prime Minister will come clean, about the allegation that he knew the risks, that he was warned, that he was told and that is the issue in the motion before the House today." However the Commons voted 309 to 175, a majority of 134, to reject Labour's motion calling on ministers to publish the information.

Labour's Bridget Phillipson said the Government must come clean (Daily Mirror/Andy Stenning)

The Government has been savaged after more than 100 schools in England were closed or partially closed amid concerns over the safety RAAC. In a bruising attack at PMQs Keir Starmer branded the Government "cowboys"

Following the vote Ms Phillipson fumed: “The Conservatives have voted to cover up the truth about the Prime Minister’s failure to act on dangerous buildings and the true scale of this crisis. Time and again Conservative Ministers, including Rishi Sunak, have tried to pass the buck when it comes to who is responsible for the mess that schools and families find themselves in.

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“Labour knows that children can’t get a first class education in a second class school, it’s incredible that the Tories don’t. The next Labour government will ensure schools are fit for purpose and children are safe."

On Tuesday Schools Minister Nick Gibb suggested that the Prime Minister, when chancellor in 2021, had gone with other priorities over a request to increase funding to fix England's schools. And Mr Sunak was accused by former DfE permanent secretary Jonathan Slater of refusing to fully fund a programme to rebuild the country's crumbling schools when he was in the Treasury.

In a fiery exchange at PMQs earlier today the Labour leader fumed that crucial work on schools recommended way back in 2010 had yet to be carried out. And he voiced his fury after Education Secretary Gillian Keegan splashed £34million on her department's Westminster offices as schools deteriorated.

He reeled off a list of schools on Labour's schools building list when it was last in Government - which are now crumbling. The opposition leader told MPs: "It's the sort of thing you expect from cowboy builders., saying everyone else is wrong, everyone else is to blame, saying they've done an effing good job." And he continued: "In this case the cowboys are running the country."

He said parents would be furious after Ms Keegan signed off on £34million to refurbish her department's Westminster school in spite of the desperate work needed to repair schools. Mr Starmer said: "Can he explain to parents whose children aren't at school this week, why he thinks a blank cheque for a Tory minister's offices is a better use of money than stopping schools collapsing?"

Education Secretary Gillian Keegan told MPs that it would be "inaccurate, incomplete, and inappropriate to disclose the details requested of the sensitive negotiations between His Majesty's Treasury and individual Government departments".

She added: "Inaccurate because it would only show part of the picture of a complex decision-making process that takes place between multiple departments, multiple ministers, officials and other individuals with varying priorities.

"Incomplete because such a process has to look across the board at priorities and trade-offs for all Government departments to ensure we can deliver for everyone, yet this motion focuses on only one. Inappropriate because it would be categorically in breach of the longstanding tradition and expectation of confidential and often commercially sensitive information not being disclosed into the public domain, and of allowing officials to give full and frank advice to ministers."

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Dave Burke