Lets start with the story thats dominated the uk Political Agenda for the last few days. Rishi sunak says its Utterly Wrong to blame him forfailing to tackle the issue of unsafe concrete in school buldings. As thousands of children return to classrooms today after the summer break, its emerged that more than a hundred schools in england and scotland will be closed or partially shut. Its over Safety Concerns about what is known as raac a type of concrete, thats known to be at risk of crumbling. Our Political Editor chris mason reports on a busy first day back for mps. You probably hadnt heard of it until the other day, but this stuff concrete that can get crumbly is building into a political mess. Did rishi sunak, when he was chancellor, walk away from repairs happening sooner . The man who used to be the Department For Educations most senior Civil Servant reckons he did. I was absolutely amazed to see that the decision made by the government was to halve the School Rebuilding programme
The man who used to be the Department For Educations most senior Civil Servant reckons he did. I was absolutely amazed to see that the decision made by the government was to halve the School Rebuilding programme down from 100 a year to 50 a year. The chancellor, of course, was at the time . Rishi sunak. So, what does the Prime Minister make of that . I think that is completely and utterly wrong. Actually, one of the first things i did as chancellor in my first Spending Review in 2020 was to announce a new ten year School Rebuilding programme for 500 schools. Now, that equates to about 50 schools a year that will be refurbished or rebuilt. And if you look at what weve been doing over the previous decade, thats completely in line with what weve always done. This Secondary School in County Durham was meant to open for the new term tomorrow, but it cant because of dangerous concrete. In both 2020 and 2021, the government promised 50 schools a year would be rebuilt. In 2019, the National Au
The north of scotland. Here more of a breeze and more cloud, a few spots of rain, temperatures mid to high teens. Elsewhere a glorious afternoon with widespread hot sunshine. Mid to high 20s. Close to 30 in the south east. 29 for the london area. Could be higher than that. Tonight it is a fine end to the day, clear skies, that. Tonight it is a fine end to the day, clearskies, mist that. Tonight it is a fine end to the day, clear skies, mist and fog developing again, maybe some thicker patches in Eastern England and that front across the north of scotland. Cooler in some rural spots in scotland. Tomorrow we start off with mist and fog that will soon clear. The chance of a shower in western areas, Northern Ireland and south west england. Most places dry and sunny with light winds and temperatures mid to high 20s. Wednesday maybe more cloud in the mix. Some coastal mist and fog. That should lift and burn away. We draw up should lift and burn away. We draw up some warm and humid airfrom fr
Afternoon. This is the latest from the newsroom. Angela rayner is the new shadow deputy Prime Minister and levelling up secretary. She replaces lisa nandy, whos becomes shadow cabinet minister for international development. International development. Shabana mahmood takes the role of shadow secretary for justice liz kendall takes work and pensions and steve reed takes environment, food and rural affairs. It comes as the keir starmer reshuffles his top team, which began earlier afterjim which began earlier after jim mcmahon said he would step down from his post as shadow environment secretary. An independent review says former cabinet minister sir Gavin Williamson should apologise to mps for bullying the former chief whip. He sent offensive chief whip. He sent offensive Text Messages to wendy morton after he wasnt invited to the late queens funeral. The panel late queens funeral. The panel says sir gavin should also take part in appropriate behaviour training. The Prime Minister trainin
A type of concrete, thats known to be at risk of crumbling. Meanwhile, in the last couple of hours another twist with the Education Secretary caught on camera voicing herfrustrations about the media coverage. This is Gillian Keegan after an interview with itv news. Does anyone ever say, you have done a good job cos everyone else has sat on thei and done nothing . No signs of that, no . The footage was captured by itv news as the Camera Repositioned for extra shots at the end of an interview with the minister, while she was still wearing her microphone. Gillian keegan has apologised for those remarks. Gillian keegan, you said everyone else had sat on their backsides which suggests you think people had been pulling their weight, who are you talking about . It was nobody in particular, it was an off the cuff remark after the News Interview had finished or apparently after it had finished. I would like to apologise for my choice language there. That was unnecessary. But it was an off the c