The #RAAC crisis continues in #schools with the Govt. compounding the problem by refusing requests fr #exam help for students in schools where facilities are unusable due to the risk of building collapse....

This story remains a metaphor for how the UK's approach to #infrastructure (cost-cutting & skipped maintenance) is not sustainable.... and as we know this is not an issue limited to schools.

(article also contains a helpful graphic on the RAAC problem)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-67781489

More on the #RAAC problem in #schools;

the number of effected schools far surpasses the number of 'slots' on the #Tories school rebuilding programme;

But even if there was funding, the #construction sector has too little capacity to conduct the work in the next coupe, of years;

So, #schoolchidren's safety, like so much of Britain's welfare has become a lottery (possibly linked to whether you have a Tory MP?).

The wreckers continue to destroy our country....

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/dec/23/raac-concrete-schools-england-repairs-latest-figures

While #RAAC revelations raised the profile of #infrastructure problems & lack of maintenance across the #publicsector, especially in #health & #education, if you're expecting #JeremyHunt to fund a massive programme of remedial works, then you're likely to be disappointed.

Rather than dealing with our crumbling buildings, he'll be setting out how to increase #taxes on most of us (by allowing 'fiscal drag' - not using allowances - to continue) while helping the rich by cutting #InheritanceTax!

And the #RAAC crisis gets worse, with another 61 building's across over 40 #schools found to be have a RAAC problem, bringing the total 214 buildings....

And another 18 #hospitals have also confirmed they have RAAC in their buildings.

So, weak regulation (damn all that red tape), cost cutting (hey, 'efficiency gains'), and corruption (my mates' firm is the best contractor), all add up to yet another failure of governance...

just another week in #tory Britain

As Torsten Bell notes, a key problem behind so many issues is a lack of #investment - from the #NHScrisis to #RAAC in #schools, from our #productivity problems, to the state of our #infrastructure; so much would be different if the UK invested at the rate more normal across #Europe.

But notably behind the UK's seeming short-termism is, to me, a wider problem:

in the UK we have just stopped believing in the future... with devastating effects across society!

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/oct/01/hs2-raac-potholes-the-symptoms-of-a-lack-of-investment-are-everywhere

As international architects & civil engineers become conversant with details of the UK's #RAAC, a clear consensus is emerging:
its a particularly UK crisis.

RAAC & its associated building components have been in wide use across the world, predating widened UK usage in the 60s/70s... but other countries seem to have better regulations on use, better installation & better maintenance.

The general conclusion is its the UK's cost-cutting & miss-use of RAAC that is to blame.

Who'd have thought!

No-one round here is going to be surprised that the condition of #roads is deteriorating - its just one more aspect of the toxic Americanisation of the UK's #economy.

JK Galbraith once (famously) characterised the US as exhibiting 'private affluence & public squalor' and this is increasingly what we see in the UK - the continued delaying of #maintenance has wider impacts than just the #RAAC crisis

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/13/pothole-repairs-on-local-roads-in-england-sink-to-lowest-level-in-five-years

@sjwrenlewis on blistering form this morning:

'The whole current system, where dangerously crumbling concrete is kept in place because fixing it would require some borrowing, is predicated on a kind of deficit fetishism that treats reducing government borrowing as more important than almost anything else, including teaching children'!

Its sensible & prudent to invest in social #infrastructure.

#RAAC #austerity

If you read one thing today, make it this!

https://mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2023/09/the-next-time-someone-says-government.html

Normally I don't watch #rugby, but for family reasons I am sitting in a room while the #RugbyWorldCup England vs. Argentina match is on.

And I can't help but think what UK #politics really needs is a Foul Play Review Officer.

So, you are accused of ignoring warnings about #RAAC #maintenance & dangers of #building collapse.

You need to withdraw from day-to-day politics while we review you messages & replay the decisions you made, before it decided whether you can return!

I can dream, can't I?

Camilla Cavendish puts her finger on the key point underlying the #RAAC crisis... a long-term, British desire for a quick/cheap fix:

'Letting cowboy builders use shoddy materials in schools has been a false economy, yet another sad aspect of the short-termism in which we all — voters, journalists, politicians — conspire'!

There's going to be blame a plenty to spread around!

And the #RAAC crisis keeps getting bigger - now problems have been founds at both #Heathrow & #Gatwick.... what is now going to prove interesting is which organisations in the growing difficulties have a handle on the maintenance, which don't & the role of #austerity in the public sector.. this is one can that has been kicked down the road a number of times but has resolutely come to a halt (it would seem)

The UK's #RAAC #buildings crisis really looks like the results of a period when 'systems built' facilities were all the rage in the public sector (and more widely).

In the 1970s, prefabricated buildings seemed to offer the solution to assembling functional buildings.

Of course, there were two problems:

a. They were never meant to last forever & so without maintenance & component renewal a crisis of stability was always going to happen;

b. in many cases they were badly constructed anyway!

In a country where there are still buildings in use from hundreds of years ago, this apology for Raac seems short sighted, albeit in line with current economic policy. #UK #Raac #Economics

well, well, well, the majority of #schools that are effects by the #RAAC #buildings crisis are in #Tory constituencies - some might see this as 'chickens coming home to roost' after over a decade of #education defunding.

A cynic might add, that it was only after this distribution become clear did the #tories 'spring into action'... as many have already suggested here, no doubt slightly delayed while they figured out how to channel the repair funds to their mates!
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/sep/06/raac-crisis-pupils-at-24-schools-in-england-forced-to-study-remotely

In #capitalism there is always an opportunity in a crisis:

From today's Guardian:
Boom for prefab classroom makers as England schools’ Raac crisis deepens - Modular buildings hire firm inundated with inquiries from schools needing temporary classrooms

#RAAC #schools

https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/sep/06/boom-for-prefab-classroom-makers-as-england-schools-raac-crisis-deepens

It looks increasingly like #RishiSunak is not going to be able to outrun the #schools #RAAC #building crisis ... oh dear!

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/sep/05/more-than-half-of-dilapidated-english-schools-were-refused-rebuilding-money

Aha, as was expected the #NHS is now being required to 'check' for #RAAC, as if the Estates people were not already aware, had not already told the Govt, & the maintenance budgets hadn't been cut by the #tories thereby constraining earlier remedial action(s).

This is looking glass politics, where politicians pretend to be surprised by something that they've been told a number of times already, but now they are going to 'act' immediately!

FFS... (in)action has consequences you numpties!

@BylinesEast reporting that, early February, two months after the risk level was raised to high, Education Secretary Gillian Keegan remarked, “We just need to keep the lid on this for two years and then it’s someone else’s problem.“

Funny, that's not what she's saying now that it's become a highly public matter...

#school #RAAC

https://eastangliabylines.co.uk/keegan-keeps-the-lid-on-raac/