School Building Closures
Debate between Gillian Keegan and Richard Foord(7 months, 1 week ago)
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Richard Foord (Tiverton and Honiton) (LD)
Colyton Grammar School in my corner of Devon is one of the 27 schools added today to the list of 147 schools already known to have RAAC on site. The National Association of Head Teachers has pointed out that propping up ceilings with metal poles is clearly not a serious option. I want Colyton Grammar School to be able to open up the small part of its estate that has had to close, but if there is new money, and works will not impact on the existing school rebuilding programme, what impact can we expect them to have on funding pledged last year to schools such as Tipton St John Primary School and Tiverton High School?
Gillian Keegan
I can assure the hon. Gentleman that we are doing a very professional job. There is no intention of propping schools up with metal poles; they will largely be horizontal props involving tempered beams, which is how buildings are built in the first place—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Houghton and Sunderland South (Bridget Phillipson) shows her absolute ignorance of this. They will be either steel structures or wooden structures that will then have another roof underneath. I urge everybody to go and look at these classrooms, because they will see that there is no vertical propping—not in any of the schools that I have seen so far—and that is certainly not a long-term solution. The hon. Gentleman will be satisfied that these are very high-quality solutions for our children.