Rishi Sunak faces PMQ review over schools’ concrete crisis
Ishi Sunak will face Sir Keir Starmer at Prime Minister’s Questions for the first time in seven weeks as he comes under pressure to reveal what he knew about the crumbling concrete crisis in schools.
The Conservative Party leader is embroiled in the row after one of his ministers suggested Mr Sunak allow the rebuilding of 50 schools a year when he was chancellor, rejecting a request for the same treatment for 200 schools.
Concerns over reinforced aerated concrete (Raac) have led to more than 100 schools in England being partially or completely closed.
Mr Sunak is likely to be grilled by the Labor leader over funding made available to fix faulty concrete in classrooms when the two face off on Wednesday for the first time since Parliament returned from the summer recess.
Labor has already signaled it wants to use a secretive parliamentary mechanism to find out what the prime minister knew about the crisis during his tenure at the Treasury.
Once again this week the Education Minister has to answer serious questions about her behavior
Mr Sunak has been accused of halving the school rebuilding program during his time as chancellor, providing funding to replace 100 run-down schools, while 400 refurbishments were needed, according to former Department for Education (DfE) secretary of state Jonathan Slater .
The prime minister has rejected the attack on his financial records.
Elsewhere, shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson said under-fire Education Secretary Gillian Keegan had “serious questions to answer” after it emerged that a company the senior Tory’s husband has links with had secured a May 1 IT contract million pounds from a school reconstruction fund.
As reported by the Daily Mirror, which broke the news of the deal, Michael Keegan states on his LinkedIn social media page that he is a non-executive director of technology company Centerprise.
The company was one of six suppliers awarded contracts to replace server infrastructure earlier this year. The money came from the DfE’s school rebuilding program fund.
Ms Phillipson said: “This appears to be a serious conflict of interest and there will be eyebrows raised that the Keegans appear to have benefited from a shrinking pot of money for rebuilding schools.”
There is no suggestion of any wrongdoing by Mr and Mrs Keegan.
A DfE spokeswoman said: “Ministers were not involved in the procurement process for these contracts, which were awarded in line with the government’s existing commercial procedures.”
This comes after Ms Keegan felt forced to apologize following her rant on Monday in an outburst against those who she said had “sat on their backsides and done nothing” against Raac.
Labor will seek to increase scrutiny of Mr Sunak over the Raac crisis with plans to introduce a modest address request, a mechanism to demand papers from government departments.
They want the evidence provided by the DfE to No 10 and the Treasury relating to the consultation on the construction issues to be made public.
As part of this action, it will also be urged to see all related correspondence ahead of the 2020 and 2021 spending reviews and the 2022 Spring and Autumn Statements to show what advice was given to Mr Sunak as Chancellor about the need to replace Raac.
Ms Phillipson said: “Today we give Conservative MPs a choice: vote with Labor and give parents the right to know who is responsible for this mess, or vote to understand the true extent of this crisis and the failure to do so from the Prime Minister. “Keep our children safe.”
Ms Keegan, who has come under fire for her handling of the concrete crisis, defended the Prime Minister’s previous actions to protect the safety of school buildings.
She said: “As Chancellor, the Prime Minister launched the School Rebuilding Programs to deliver 500 schools over the next decade.
“Furthermore, the Conservatives have invested £15 billion in schools since 2015.
“In addition, investments this year will be almost 29% higher in real terms than last year.”
She continued: “An independent review found Labour’s school funding program was poorly targeted and complex.
“It has done nothing to improve the poor condition of schools, particularly those affected by Raac. In contrast, the Labor-led Welsh Government has done nothing and failed to take action against schools in Wales.”
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/rishi-sunak-gillian-keegan-prime-minister-labour-parliament-b1105114.html Rishi Sunak faces PMQ review over schools’ concrete crisis
