Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what plans her Department has to monitor the quality of new Education Funding Agency-funded school building stock in relation to (a) the health and wellbeing of end-users and (b) its running and maintenance costs; and if she will take steps to ensure that the outcome of any such monitoring informs phase 2 of the Priority Schools Building Programme programme.

My department is currently developing a strategy to extend its post-occupancy evaluation programme to include all Education Funding Agency funded building stock.

Post-occupancy evaluation, which includes assessment of recognised measures of health and wellbeing such as daylight, air quality and ventilation, is already being undertaken on new schools opened under the Priority School Building Programme (PSBP). We are also looking at the running cost of the new buildings and how we could assess maintenance costs going forward. Where appropriate, lessons learnt will be incorporated on PSBP phase 2 and other EFA-funded building programmes.