Asbestos in Schools

Jim Sheridan Excerpts

Tuesday 17th March 2015 Commons Chamber

[Jim Sheridan (Paisley and Renfrewshire North) (Lab)]

I am extremely grateful for this opportunity to raise the important issue of asbestos in schools. It is an important issue not only for the people who work in the schools but for the parents of the children who are being educated in them.

The recent report on asbestos in schools is welcome, but it is unfortunate that it was not published earlier. We have been waiting more than eight months for its publication, which was always described as imminent. None the less, it provides a useful, informed and welcome background to the debate on the effects of asbestos in schools. Much of it is based on, or responds to, the publication of a report on asbestos in schools by the all-party parliamentary occupational safety and health group, which I chair. I am sure that this report would never have been produced had it not been for the work of the all-party group, the joint union asbestos committee, the GMB and the Asbestos in Schools Group. May I particularly mention Mr Michael Lees, who lost his teacher wife to mesothelioma and has campaigned consistently since?

Let me digress slightly by referring to an exclusive report in The Independent by Andrew Grice, who interviewed the Minister. The report states:

“The Schools Minister warned that Mr Cameron’s announcement of 500 more free schools in the 2015-20 parliament was ‘a number picked out of a hat.’ He warned: ‘The Tories want to scatter 500 new schools around the country, regardless of whether they will be good quality schools or whether they are actually needed. This is a barmy way to make policy.’”

The report continued:

“He added: ‘Worse still, it would mean a £4bn raid on other budgets, consigning children and teachers to crumbling classrooms and leaving some without a school place at all. It is impossible to justify.’

Mr Laws claimed Downing Street had not wanted to go public before the election about the need to tackle asbestos in school buildings, even though it was a ‘child safety issue.’”

I would certainly appreciate it if the Minister expanded on that in his response.

The Department for Education has acknowledged that children are more at risk from asbestos exposure than adults are. That is a significant step forward; it acknowledges that asbestos in schools is an issue. It includes a call for greater transparency from schools and employers, and makes it clear that asbestos training is compulsory for teachers and supporting staff. All those who are responsible for managing asbestos will receive training. That is well overdue, given the complete lack of awareness in many schools, as outlined in the report. There is also a welcome commitment to develop air sampling.

That is all a step forward but it by no means goes far enough. More than 291 schoolteachers have died of mesothelioma since 1980. They were dying at a rate of three per year in 1980, but the number of deaths has increased each year and they are now dying at a rate of 19 a year. The report acknowledges that caretakers, cleaners, maintenance staff and children are known to be at a greater risk. However, statistics do not show how many pupils have been killed by past exposure, as people often die more than 40 years after exposure, by which time they may have worked in a wide range of jobs. Let us not forget, however, that for every teacher working in a school there are 20 to 30 children and they are more at risk.

[Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on securing this Adjournment debate on a very serious issue. It is very important that we recognise that it is not only staff and support workers—the teachers and so on—but children who could contract asbestos-related diseases in school. Should we not be doing everything we can to take the right measures to reduce the incidence in children, rather than just looking across the board at teachers and staff?

[Jim Sheridan]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right about that, and again I have to congratulate the National Union of Teachers on its assistance in dealing with this issue. The genuine concern is that we do not scare parents into believing that their children cannot go to school for fear of catching mesothelioma or other asbestos-related diseases, and we have tried to follow that approach through the report the TUC has drawn up. However, we say clearly in the report that action has to be taken. We also recognised that we cannot deal with this overnight and that the process has to be gradual, with gradual investment. That should start with some of the older schools being stripped of asbestos, and we could take things on gradually from there.

The review is somewhat complacent in places. It states that the Health and Safety Executive’s view is that schools overall are low-risk health and safety environments, similar to offices and retail premises. But there is a fundamental difference between offices, retail premises and schools, which is that schools contain children. The fabric of school buildings suffers considerably more disturbance and damage than most offices and retail premises. In addition, children are in the building for long periods of time and they are more vulnerable than adults to exposure to asbestos. However, most parents would not think that 4,000 to 6,000 people dying over a 20-year period as a result of attending school was low risk.

I am also surprised that the Government are unaware of the extent, type and condition of asbestos in schools. They have just completed a two-year survey on the condition of school buildings, which deliberately excluded asbestos. The review simply states:

“Based upon the age of the school estate, we can estimate that a majority of schools in England contain some asbestos, although the exact amount is unknown.”

That is an astonishing statement after a multi-million pound audit. If when the Government first came to office they had simply asked the local authorities, they would have found that the something like 87% of schools contained asbestos.

Although this debate is principally about schools in England, this is a UK-wide problem.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for bringing this matter to the House for consideration. In Northern Ireland, a significant number of school buildings still contain asbestos. There has been a programme to address when asbestos becomes a danger, but the fact is that asbestos that has not been disturbed or damaged is better left alone. The policy in Northern Ireland is that properly managed asbestos should not cause any health problems. Has the hon. Gentleman found that that is the case in some of the schools with which he has been involved? Sometimes the best way to address the asbestos issue is not to do anything until the school comes to the end of its life.

[Jim Sheridan]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. Experts tell us quite clearly that asbestos is safe if left alone, and I have vast experience of that in my own life. When I worked in the shipyards, asbestos could be easily identified. We were told that if it was left alone, it was comparatively safe. However, in school buildings, where people are banging doors, putting drawing pins in walls, and maintaining pipes, asbestos cannot be left undisturbed. It is important that maintenance staff are trained to identify asbestos and to know how best to treat it. If would be preferable if asbestos could be left alone, but not all schools can do that. Indeed, the banging of doors causes the stuff to circulate in the air.

As I said, asbestos is a UK-wide problem. A recent report in Scotland showed that 79% of schools contained asbestos. That was based on responses from 22 of the 33 councils. Since 2007, the number of schools in Scotland with asbestos in a poor or bad condition has fallen from 39% to 17%. That is because the Scottish Government have for many years collated data on the condition of the school estate and presented it online in a clear, understandable format that allows people to see how the measures that are in place to improve the school stock are succeeding.

The Convention of Scottish Local Authorities states:

“there has been significant expenditure imposed on Councils throughout Scotland through the presence of asbestos in education premises (mainly schools).”

I am reliably informed that Wales also has a major and well publicised problem with asbestos in schools.

It is the Government’s responsibility to ensure that children and staff are not harmed simply by attending school. It is good to see that the Government are finally going to ensure that those who manage asbestos are trained to do so and that the guidance to schools will be updated, but unfortunately that just does not go far enough.

What are lacking are concrete proposals and a strategic vision to introduce the long-term strategies needed to eradicate asbestos from our schools. There needs to be a proper assessment across the UK of the level and condition of asbestos in the nation’s schools so that plans can be drawn up to remove the worst of it as it continues to deteriorate. Simply leaving it in place until a school is refurbished will put millions of school kids and other workers at risk.

The Government must also introduce more inspections to assess how well asbestos is being managed and spot where children are being exposed to risk. It is simply not good enough to leave it to chance, especially as a recent trial survey by the Health and Safety Executive led to a number of enforcement notices.

In conclusion, the report should be seen not as the end of the line, but simply as the launching pad for a proper, comprehensive policy aimed at ridding our schools of this killer dust once and for all. Speaking personally, I have seen far too many deaths from asbestos-related diseases such as mesothelioma, and watching someone die from such a disease is horrendous. I remember a former workmate with the disease describe it as feeling like a tree growing inside you, eventually choking you to death. I really do not want to see our children suffering that experience in 10, 20 or 40 years’ time.