Safety fears as catalogue of defects found in PPP schools
MORE than half of Scotland’s councils have uncovered defects in their school buildings following an urgent review of safety standards.
The Scottish Government ordered inspections to be carried out by engineers after nine tons of masonry dropped from a wall onto an Edinburgh playground last year.
It has emerged that faults similar to those which caused the collapse at Oxgangs Primary have been found at dozens of schools nationwide.
Most were constructed under the Public Private Partnership (PPP) scheme, which has seen taxpayers locked into contracts lasting decades and costing billions of pounds.
The catalogue of defects includes missing ties to stabilise cavity walls and problems with roof beams and lintels.
Last night, Tory education spokesman Liz Smith said: ‘This should ring alarm bells for the Scottish Government, which has been repeatedly warned about the way in which school buildings are inspected.’
The list of faults was uncovered by Holyrood’s education and skills committee, which last week heard damning claims from council chiefs that PPP contractors had ‘deliberately cut corners’ to save money.
MSPs on the committee wrote to all 32 councils asking for details of what the emergency surveys had uncovered.
So far, 27 have responded with 17 of them admitting they have detected defects.
East Lothian said faults were identified at four PPP high schools and five primaries. Aber- deenshire found ‘structural anomalies’ at five, which will be fixed over the summer holidays.
Five buildings were affected in Angus with four in Inverclyde and three each in Dundee, Western Isles, Stirling and West Lothian.
Several authorities – including Glasgow, Fife, Midlothian and Perth and Kinross – admitted they had discovered problems but did not disclose how many properties had fallen short of building standards.
Following the Oxgangs incident, Edinburgh City Council closed all 17 schools built in the first wave of PPP between 2002 and 2005 pending urgent inspections and remedial work. Around 8,000 pupils were affected.
The authority has now found faults at a further five schools.
Dave Watson, of trade union Unison, said: ‘Much more work needs to be done to ensure that the issues raised in this inquiry are being dealt with across the whole construction sector.’
Nearly 300 Scottish schools have either been built or refurbished under PPP since 1999. Ongoing payments to contractors will total £505million this year.
Last week, when asked by the committee if PPP contractors had cut corners, Aberdeenshire Council head of facilities management, Allan Whyte, said: ‘Oh, absolutely. There’s no doubt about that.’
It comes after the recent conclusion of nine days of evidence in a Fatal Accident Inquiry into the death of Keane WallisBennett, 12, who died in 2014 when a wall fell on her at Liberton High, Edinburgh.
The verdict is expected later this year.
Comment – Page 16
‘This should ring alarm bells’