Labour Leader Sir Keir Starmer attacks Rishi Sunak for his government’s record on dealing with the crisis of RAAC in school buildings saying, “it is the inevitable result of 13 years of cutting corners, botched jobs, sticking plaster politics”. In reply the prime minister defends the government’s record on education, claiming the country has the “best readers in the western world”. Report by Blairm. Like us on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/itn and follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/itn
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00:00 The truth is that this crisis is the inevitable result of 13 years of cutting corners, botched
00:07 jobs and sticking plaster politics. It is the sort of thing you expect from cowboy builders,
00:14 saying that everyone else is wrong and to blame, and protesting that they have done
00:18 an effing good job, even as the ceiling falls in. The difference is that in this case the
00:26 cowboys are running the country. Is he not ashamed that after 13 years of Tory government
00:34 children are cowering under steel supports, stopping their classroom roof, falling in?
00:43 Before today he never once raised this issue with me in Parliament. It was not even worthy
00:47 of a single mention in his so-called landmark speech on education this summer. If we had
00:54 listened to him, our kids would have been off school and locked down for longer. It
00:58 is as simple as that. He talks about 13 years. Let us see what happened. When we came into
01:03 office, two thirds of school were good and outstanding. Now it is 90%. We introduced
01:10 the pupil premium to get more funding to the most disadvantaged pupils. Today they are
01:16 75% more likely to go to university. As a result of our reforms, we now have the best
01:23 readers in the western world. That is what 13 years of education reform gets you, all
01:30 of which are opposed by the party opposite.
01:32 (audience laughing)