Mrs. Manningasked the Minister of Education how many schools, planned on a lower standard than that of the 1944 building regulations, he has approved during the last year; what is the percentage of saving achieved by the lower standard; and under what section of the Act he has approved the lower standard.
§ Mr. Tomlinson;In view of the need for economy in the cost of new school provision and of the fact that the Building Regulations of 1945 have, in certain respects, been found to be insufficiently flexible, I have been having them reviewed. Meanwhile local educational authorities have been permitted to plan schools on the basis of changes that are projected. Interim amendments are now about to be made and these and other amendments will be embodied in a new set of regulations to be issued later. My expectation is that, except for a number of cases falling under Section 7 (2) (b) of the Education Act, 1948, no school premises which are built to plans approved within the last year will, when 150W taken in use, fail to conform to the regulations. I could not answer the first and second parts of my hon. Friend's Question without undue expenditure of time and labour.