School in Leicester impacted by crumbling Raac concrete 'for months'

Concerns over crumbling concrete in schools have overshadowed the first day of the new school year for many pupils in the East Midlands.

More than 100 schools in England are thought to have been partially shut or fully closed over safety concerns over the lightweight concrete Raac (Reinforced Autoclaved Aerated Concrete).

The material was used in schools, colleges and other building construction from the 1950s until the mid-1990s, the Standing Committee on Structural Safety has said - but it now comes with a number of risks, including ceiling collapses.

At one school in Leicester, where some pupils returned last week, teachers say they have been dealing with issues relating to Raac for months.

Key Stage 2 pupils at Mayflower Primary are having to be bussed to an alternative site elsewhere in the city as the school remains partially closed due to Raac issues.

And although inconvenient, this is an improvement on the end of the last academic year, when pupils were spread across four sites, including a community hall and a mosque, after the school was forced to close in April.

As parents you think 'OK, this is terrible'

Jamila Adam says her two nine-year-old children have been forced to attend another of the city's schools and the prolonged disruption has affected their education.

"There were external assessments for year 2 and year 6 that have to have SATs, they didn't take place," she said.

"My kids who were in year 4 at the time would have had multiplication tests at the end of the year, that didn't take place."

"As parents you think 'OK this is terrible' but kids, most of them took it in their stride."

“I was lucky, there were four sites used before the summer holidays and one parent had three kids to drop off at three different sites," she explained.

“The kids have been OK with it, surprisingly. The fact they go on the buses with their friends makes it like a school trip for them."

“The staff deserve a medal, they have been great with it and always want to look after the children.”

'This whole year could be the same'

Amreen Sheikh, who has a seven-year-old and a nine-year-old at the school, said: “It was a bit of a headache before, for us and the children.

“We were struggling because everything was new, the kids were used to being in school. Now we are used to it. The kids are fine now but before they found it difficult because they used to get travel sick."

She added: “The staff have been good, the teachers always help us and look after the children.

“I think this whole year could be the same."

The Prime Minister himself has been accused of cutting the money used to rebuild schools when he was chancellor.

Teachers and the association representing school leaders say the Government should have been better prepared.

"This was a form of concrete that was used in the fifties, sixties and seventies, it only ever had a thirty-year shelf life. It would be nice to think there was somebody there who had a renewal plan," said Geoff Barton, Association of School and College Leaders.

"But in 2018 a school actually collapsed so surely in 2018 onwards that plan should have been in place and what we find out now is there hasn't been a plan for that and the PM when he was chancellor made it more difficult to build more schools."

"Frankly the people who I represent, school and college leaders, the very last thing they needed was this. They should be focusing on learning and, instead, they're focusing on whether they have a certain type of concrete".

The Government says the cost of removing Raac won't fall to individual schools - but the education secretary says the Government is not responsible for maintaining school buildings.

"It's not the job of the DfE but we chose to do that because we wanted to make sure that we had that information centrally," explained Gillian Keegan.

"Now we're on it we will know more than any government in the world about Raac in our schools because of this process that we've been in. It's centralised which is not normally what we do as a government but we've chosen to do that, we've chosen to take the action and we will always put the safety of children first".

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