Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, whether her Department is taking steps to improve the quality of school buildings.

Well maintained, safe school buildings are a priority for the Department.

The Department allocates annual condition funding to schools and those responsible for school buildings to maintain and improve the condition of the school estate. The Department has allocated over £13 billion for this purpose since 2015, including £1.8 billion committed for the current financial year.

The Department has recently announced that eligible schools will also receive an allocation from an additional £447 million in capital funding in 2022/23 for capital improvements to buildings and facilities, prioritising works to improve energy efficiency. Condition allocations are published online at: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/school-capital-funding.

The School Rebuilding Programme (SRP) will carry out major rebuilding and refurbishment projects at 500 schools across England, with buildings prioritised based on their condition. There are now 400 projects in the programme. The most recent set of 239 schools were announced in December 2022. Confirmed projects can be found at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/school-rebuilding-programme.

All new and refurbished school buildings delivered by the Department must meet the same high standard of design and construction. The specification is updated on a four year cycle based on good industry practice. The latest specification (S21) is the first to have net zero carbon in operation standards and includes approaches to mitigate and adapt to the effects of climate change.