It would have been nice to see the Government hit the ground running after the summer recess, with fresh ideas to tackle the difficult challenges we’re facing. Unfortunately, they have presented the public with fresh challenges, rather than fresh solutions, shockingly closing the doors of some of Britain’s long neglected school buildings as they literally disintegrate from inadequate ancient concrete and underinvestment in basic safety measures. The fact that some children are unable to return to school this week is an abject failing.

The safety of children and staff in schools should be our highest priority. I know that parents will have worries at this unsettling time. I want to let you know that I have received a letter from the Department for Education which states that they believe no schools in the constituency are affected by the problem concrete known as RAAC, but that they are undertaking precautionary investigations into one local school. I understand that Tameside Council have also commissioned further purely precautionary checks on a couple of other older premises.

I have watched the media this week, including the denial from the Education Secretary that the Government is responsible for schools, topped only by her insistence that she’s doing a great job, with growing anger and incredulity. But I am also worried by the increasing despair I hear from people, who are sometimes so overwhelmed by the multiple failures of the present Government (on schools, crime, the NHS, the trains, the courts – I could go on..) that they’ve stopped believing it can ever be better.

So let’s not forget the schools rebuilt under the last Labour Government in our constituency – like Mossley Hollins and Hyde High School – that are not just safe and secure buildings, they’re modern and attractive places that show young people quite rightly how highly we value them and their education. And let’s also not forget this programme, known as ‘Building Schools for the Future’, was one of the very first things cancelled after the Conservatives came to power in 2010 (directly affecting Copley and Longdendale).

We also now know, from the senior civil servant at the time, that when Rishi Sunak was Chancellor he was told there was a need to rebuild 300 to 400 schools a year in England. He chose to give funding for only 100, which was then halved to 50. (Source: Jonathan Slater, Permanent Secretary of the Department of Education, 2016 – 2020).

Had the Conservatives not cancelled Labour’s school rebuilding programme in England in 2010, every secondary school building in England would have been significantly refurbished or rebuilt by 2020.

Politics is ultimately about choices. The choices made by this Government are coming home to roost. The roofs of our schools are literally falling down as a result. But it does not have to be this way.

Pictured: A younger me celebrating the Labour government investment in Mossley Hollings with then Education Secretary, Ed Balls. Choices matter.