Question to the Department for Education:

To ask His Majesty's Government what assessment they have made of the impacts on indoor air quality of the practice of closing windows while running air conditioning units; and whether any such assessment informs their policy around the installation of air conditioning units in schools.

We are improving infrastructure and strengthening resilience across the education estate through our Education Estates Strategy.

The strategy includes a new £710 million Renewal and Retrofit Programme to improve condition and climate resilience, investing almost £3 billion per year by 2034/35 in capital maintenance and improvement of schools and colleges. The department is also investing almost £20 billion in the School Rebuilding Programme through to 2034/35, delivering climate‑resilient buildings at over 750 schools.

We have recently launched a new construction framework and updated design standards, setting our requirements for all new and refurbished school buildings delivered by the department. These standards promote integrated environmental design and cover overheating risk assessments, cross-ventilation, indoor air quality and the use of cooling through ground-source heat pumps.