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A recent suggestion by a former government property leader that schools should “self-fund” building projects through “creative” uses of their site, rather than rely on public funding, is wholly unrealistic and undermines the public service ethos of state education.

The schools estate is grappling with a legacy of sustained underfunding, which has left schools and classrooms riddled with a litany of issues, including asbestos, leaks and extremes of temperature.

The Department for Education previously found that . The reinforced autoclaved aerated concrete (RAAC) crisis, which continues to affect many schools, further highlights the extent to which the school estate has been mismanaged.

Long-term decline of school buildings

A found that 38 per cent of schools in England were past their initial design life, and approximately 700,000 pupils were being taught in schools that required major rebuilding or refurbishment.

There has been a sustained failure by successive governments to get to grips with the scale of the problem. Earlier this year the government published its 10-year .

Under these plans, just 250 additional schools will be rebuilt or refurbished by 2034-35 - barely 1 per cent of the schools estate.

This follows the previous Conservative government’s 2021 commitment to rebuild 518 schools over a decade - a programme that we criticised at the time for being

While accepting that difficult decisions have to be made on public spending and finance, we cannot accept the premise that, rather than expecting public funding from the government for rebuilding and refurbishment, schools should consider initiatives such as installing padel courts, using school sites for TV and film shoots, corporate conferences and renting out offices to fund essential works.

A flawed argument

There are multiple flaws in this argument. Firstly, this approach would risk exacerbating inequality between schools, with those on large sites in affluent, leafy areas more likely to have the space and attributes to attract corporate clients and expand their facilities.

Schools in deprived areas and on cramped sites are unlikely to be able to take advantage of these opportunities to the same extent.

Secondly, to build these revenue-generating padel courts and conference facilities, schools need to have the cash in the first place.

This presents something of a chicken-and-egg scenario in the context of cash-strapped budgets, with few schools likely to have the means to take a “build it and they will come” approach to funding future renovation work.

Thirdly and most importantly, the idea that the only way schools can ensure they are able to operate in safe buildings is to turn themselves into corporate or leisure destinations only serves to underline the failings of successive governments to adequately fund our public services.

This is before we even begin to consider the safeguarding and health and safety issues schools would need to manage in opening up their sites to external activity.

The financial reality

While many schools do hire out spaces outside of pupil attendance times to bring in extra revenue, this is of a different order to suggesting that essential building work should be dependent on their ability to fundraise.

The costs and risks to pupils and staff increase with every year that passes without a more ambitious programme for rebuilding and maintaining the schools estate.

We have already . Teachers have told us that extremes of temperature are their greatest concern about their school buildings, with 70 per cent saying this is a problem in their school.

We have called for investment in greater ventilation, insulation, shaded areas and flood defences in and around schools in order to make them better equipped to withstand a changing climate.

At the same time, the demands on school buildings are increasing. For example, as part of its special educational needs and disabilities reforms, the government has set out an expectation that every secondary school will have an inclusion base on site.

There are already concerns about how all schools will be able to meet this expectation and provide a fit-for-purpose and safe space within current budgetary and site constraints.

These growing pressures demand a proper strategy of sustained and long-term investment in our school buildings, which is not dependent on renting space to the highest bidder or turning school sites into leisure destinations.

Matt Wrack is the general secretary of NASUWT - The Teachers’ Union