Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, for what reason schools and colleges will be required to fund improvements to ventilation and air purification systems necessitated by the covid-19 outbreak from existing budgets.

Following the rollout of around 300,000 CO₂ monitors to schools during the autumn term, over 350,000 monitors have been delivered to over 99% of eligible maintained schools, further education colleges, and the majority of nurseries. Schools are finding the monitors helpful to manage ventilation and, in the majority of schools, colleges, and nurseries, existing ventilation measures are sufficient.

The department also announced on 2 January that it would make up to 7000 air cleaning units available for poorly ventilated teaching spaces in state-funded education schools, colleges and nurseries where quick fixes to improve ventilation are not possible. All state funded schools (primary and secondary), further education colleges and nurseries can apply. This is in addition to the 1,000 department-funded air cleaning units that we announced on 18 November for special educational needs and disabilities and alternative provision providers.  The deadline for applications is 9am on 17 January and units will be delivered from February 2022.

For education providers that are not eligible for a department-funded air cleaning unit, the department has launched a marketplace which provides all state funded education providers a route to purchasing air cleaning units directly from suppliers at a suitable specification and competitive price. The marketplace is available for all state funded schools (primary and secondary), further education colleges and nurseries.

Maintaining adequate ventilation remains the responsibility of individual providers. The department expects the majority of solutions to poor ventilation to be relatively minor. Day to day maintenance and minor repairs, including those to improve ventilation, should typically be funded from general maintenance budgets from revenue allocations.

Where issues are identified, providers are expected to plan and prioritise any necessary works within existing budgets. Schools and sixth form colleges also receive an annual Devolved Formula Capital Allocation to spend on small capital projects or capital purchases, while further education colleges have benefited from a Capital Transformation Fund allocation in financial year 2020-21 for addressing condition need. For more substantial capital works, education providers and those responsible for buildings have access to funding to improve the condition of buildings through different routes depending on their size and type.