[Closed] Edinburgh schools. (heads should roll)

Yes, so not only are the PFI schools incredibly expensive - far more expensive than just building the things directly - they're also built on the cheap to maximise company profits.

Waiting for the companies responsible to step in and take control.

They must have this in the project risk management somewhere.

What's the betting there's no penalty clauses in the PFI contracts? Private profits, public liabilities, that was the attraction to the companies, wasn't it?

This is not only Edinburgh. I know of three other authorities that are inspecting scholols at present.

Do remember Edinburgh are (rightly) sensitive after the wall collapse at Liberton killed a pupil a year or more back.

If only someone, somewhere could have predicted this!

Easy to blame the builder but councils and Scot.Gov.Uk probably should shoulder some blame.
MrsT is a civil servant and isn't surprised 🙄
Tjnr worked on a local school extension as a consultant structural engineer. At one point the builder was working to 3 different drawings supplied to him via council architect ❗
Then there is the saga of the towns lie sure centre!!!!!!!
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/local-news/secret-update-dg-one-leisure-6638615#B2PRDyAowse4mrSE.97

Everyone is awaiting the next saga, we have a new hospital being built.....

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-south-scotland-31837171

Yesterday Mr Swinney announced they might provide money to regenerate Stanraer. We all hope that will include upgrading the A75 so that people from the south can get there without wrecking their cars and dodging Havana from the ferry terminal!!!

Bet there's a nice handy "I'm no payin'" clause built in.

Sat through the design stage for a PPP school science labs, great big shiny list of things you could have, each with a cost for the lifetime of the contract.

Are the roads PFI too? Shocking state in Edinburgh.

Always thought something like this might happen, the schools were only built to last 25 years as it's cheaper to knockdown a building and rebuild than it is to renovate it. Even if they had built the schools to last 100 years the full heating system, electric installation, fixtures and fittings would be at the end of their life after 25 years.

I think it all stems from when labour came to power under Blair, they inherited a badly neglected and underfunded school infrastructure (not to mention all the other neglected underfunded state ran facilities but that's for another moan).
I left school in 94 and we were being taught in cold damp cabins which were meant to only be a stop gap for a couple years but were 10 - 15 years old and it seems other schools were in the same state at the time.

Schools round where I live that were built under the pfi scheme are fantastically equipped with top sports facilites (swimming pools, indoor sports halls etc), drama facilities with beautiful stages and even recording studios.

I worked in a few a couple of years ago and was impressed with the setup kids now have.

The affected schools will be patched up and made safe and after the 25 year lease is up (which some schools will only be in about 15 years) they will be replaced with another new one.
But I agree that if they are not safe then heads should roll, alas I feel this won't happen as its been a while since some were built and some contracting companies involved have gone bump, plus staff retiring/leaving the industry and it takes quite a few people to design, approve and build a modern school so lots of wriggle room for all involved.

The building I teach in was 5 years old when my dad left (teaching there) in 1978. It was only meant to last 20 years. So it's well passed that. Unfortunately I feel the monies set aside to put new windows in and make it water tight will go on patching up the newer flagship PPP schools in the region.

The same people who procured these in the authorities will be making similar poor procurement decisions whatever route they choose

1960's schools leaked as soon as they were opened and continued to leak until they were demolished. Design life was 25 years.

Edinburgh has about half? of its weans privately educated, they could be dealing with a bigger problem!

Half? Very much doubt that.

Are the roads PFI too? Shocking state in Edinburgh.

I had a sudden realisation while driving round Edinburgh the other day. The reason they spent all that money on the tram was to keep the tourist off the utterly awful roads

Edit. ^^ That quoting malarkey didn't quite work!

 

Are the roads PFI too? Shocking state in Edinburgh.

Nope, but they are in Birmingham and Sheffield. By the same company involved in the Edinburgh schools.

Edinburgh has about half? of its weans privately educated

[s]What[/s] Which school taught you statistics?

our local pfi school rebuilt and enlarged has changed hands again 3rd time and now needs to make 800,000 quids savings this year,due to massive overspend by previous lot in charge already got rid of 15 jobs,and more to come.

oh and its an ACADEMEY

our local pfi school

Fortunately Scottish schools haven't "academy" status. But I bet the PPP companies don't pay to make right so councils will need to cut back somewhere.

captainsasquatch - Member
our local pfi school

In Chester? Which one is that?

http://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/job-cuts-feared-birkenhead-park-11147238

Thanks.

No coincidence that Edinburgh Council laid off 2000 workers 2 weeks back and that a fair fee getting nice redundancy packages will have been involved in this debacle!

It will be entirely coincidental if any workers who were involved in these terrible decisions were made redundant...knowing Edinburgh Council.

The 25% figure for Edinburgh private educated kids is slightly overstated - in the sense that a fair chunk of those kids will be from outside Edinburgh (commuters and boarders, in other words). The percentage of actual edinburgher kids will be lower.

I've taught in one of the PPI Edinburgh schools and my partner still does. From day one there were faults. These were reported by the teachers as asked and reported to the company. They were never acted on as the schools had been signed off a before the snagging was complete. Eight years on the vertical blinds still blow to a 45 degree angle when the wind blows from the south, the gaps in the frames were never fixed. Wall panels were held on by only two of the four corners, the other two screws were never put in. The gym in the school I last worked in was closed for a while as the high walls weren't tied in to the external wall- they bulged. The roof blew off, was repaired and blew off again a year later. The greenhouse was condemned as Undset from day one as the leaks from the rode shorted out the electrics.

The group that built the schools was convicted of operating a cartel in pricing them up to begin with. The dicier you o the private sector. It was men against boys when the contracts wee drawn up. Very sad for pupils, parents and teachers and criminal for the companies and the LA workers who contracted them.

But crap building of schools is not new, a school in wrexham burnt down due to no fire division in its roof spaces and no smoke or fire alarms, our old school the roof blew off the four storey tower block, the boilers packed up quite often, the grounds flooded, being lower than the school building that was built on a hill,the new build bit was built of timber frame, and echoed so badly in the corridors that it all had to be carpeted to try and stop the noise,then there where the badly fitted windows, gales blew through the gaps, doors sticking,the college i went to in liverpool was contaminated by asbestos ceiling tiles.

strangely all signed off by someone on the education dept as being ok.

Based upon my experience of the public sector they're so focused (especially in Jan/Feb/Mar) on spending their CAPEX budget that they totally forget about the OPEX cost.

And you can't just blame the builders, as I'm sure they were constructed to a defined specification.

cant comment about Edinburgh schools but the crop of BSF schools built in Leeds that I saw were clearly poorly designed and never going to last long. The buildings that were replaced at the school I taught in were cold leaky and generally knackered but they were about 40 yrs old or more. the new buildings were badly designed lots of glass and flat roofing, walls were a 'commercial' type of boarding with a 3mm skim sealer . These new super schools will be needing huge amounts spent on them in the next few years... Lawyers will get fat

And let's not forget the nice little earner involved in hiring every stich of furniture in the school to the council...

I can't see how this is specifically a PFI problem, as loads of schools built in the 60s were utter sh*te. Also there will always be issues found straight after opening it is a commonly known phenomenon see bathtub curve, key thing is to get them fixed.

A 25 year design life doesn't seem unreasonable there won't be much in industry designed longer. And just cos it was designed for only 25 years doesn't mean that if it won't last a lot longer if well maintained and it has money spent on it.

strangely all signed off by someone on the education dept as being ok.

The honest, professional and diligent public sector employee must have been conned or misled

I'm sure there could never be a suggestion that Edinburgh council employees would behave dishonestly OH WAIT

Someone* thought PFI was a good idea. There's been a lot of it. Three-year-old Grauniad linky...

http://archive.is/GP2XN

*possibly Gordon Brown

Only an idiot would allow schools to be built and run by private profit making bodies and not expect [s]short cuts[/s] profit maximising measure to be standard. What happens after the 25 year contract? At present building go on, will these bodies just say out you go?

It's OK, the council can sort out the repairs like they already do when necessary for private properties

http://www.edinburghnews.scotsman.com/news/crime/repairs-scandal-corrupt-council-staff-took-bribes-1-3770768

Bunch of f****** muppets (both council and PPP company) but you can bet that the council are as bad as any other public body and will have negotiated a truly weak contract.

Will Edinburgh council building control not have inspected and signed off all 17 of these buildings at various stages?

Even if they were public financed, the work would have been tendered.

Where's T J for an opinion on E'burg council?

AFAIK it's one of those hazy things. The company tendered for the contract to build and rent the schools. The letting contract has been bought out by another group (I assume nothing the renters could do about that) the council is obviously tied into the contract by dint of having no school building for these kids. How closely do building control inspect because there seems to be some bits missing.

There appears to be a lot of misunderstanding about PFI contracts in this thread.

Generally they are built to a set of design lives which are build into the contracts for example typically structure would be for 60 yrs, often they are required to meet the design lives given in the CIBSE maintenance guide (m&e) elements

Additionally throughout the contract they are required to maintain the buildings to a defined standard

At the end of the contract there are normally a set of handback criteria and would be subject to independent survey to determine that this will be achieved, this will include an apraisal of the remaining asset life and corrective measures that are required to attain it if necessary.

Generally the end of say 25yrs the condition will be in full working order with only minor cosmetic defects

the costs associated to the costs of fixing these schools, providing temporary accommodation etc will fall to the SPC and thence to the construction company and investors. Not to the authority

If this had been traditional procurement then it would fall to the council tax payers of Edinburgh, given the track record of public pricurement in Edinburgh they should be relived that they were procured via PPP

There appears to be a lot of misunderstanding (about PFI contracts) in this thread.

the costs associated to the costs of fixing these schools, providing temporary accommodation etc will fall to the SPC and thence to the construction company and investors. Not to the authority

that is if the comapny probably formed to build them stays in buissness and doesnt go bust,

[quote=T1000 ]There appears to be a lot of misunderstanding about [b]PFI[/b] contracts in this thread.....
they were procured via [b]PPP[/b]
Which was it?

I actually thought that one of the benefits of PPP was that any costs required to maintain a building were the responsibility of the contractor and not the Local Authority. There is a 'cost' in the schools need to closed, but it is up to the contractor to make good defects.

I apologise now for not going off on some rant based on pure thin air - but this is probably the ONLY benefit of PPP. The contractor took the risk.

The partnership was between Amey, Miller Construction and the Bank of Scotland.

Miller construction built the schools, Amey maintain them and it would have been jointly financed with the bank.

Miller construction was later bought out by Galliford Try and Amey by Ferrovial. Both still going strong, Amey as a subsidy of Ferrovial still provide the FM for the schools (and most the PFI schools in Scotland).

These are multi £billion companies so hopefully they get their fingers out asap.

It seems that when it came to writing PFI contracts, they used the same person who drew up the players contracts at Leeds under Martin O Neill

Scotroutes the terms PFI PPP or P3 are interchangeable

Costs of this [b]should[/b] fall on the contractor - risk transfer is a key part of the PFI concept.

I am simply sceptical as to whether the council have a robust enough contract in place to make sure that happens and happens quickly.

I bet there are a fair few hospitals around the UK like this too

bencooper - Member

Yes, so not only are the PFI schools incredibly expensive - far more expensive than just building the things directly - they're also built on the cheap to maximise company profits.

But remember, that's entirely the council's fault, and the company are morally obliged to take advantage of explotable contracts and specs, cut costs to the bone and make as much money as they can for their shareholders.

This is indefensible though IMO, we're not talking about simple scalping here, we're talking about building [i]unsafe schools[/i]. That's a different business entirely from just making a bit of extra money or having the roof leaks.

Only an idiot would allow schools to be built and run by private profit making bodies and not expect short cuts profit maximising measure to be standard

All schools are built by the private sector (and hence for profit) as we don't have any public sector construction companies, the difference is who is the "client" for the builder PFI's fudge this hence some of the issues

The building warrant system in Scotland should have stopped unsafe designs, who did the inspections?

Well the PFI company is now in the news saying all the right things about taking the financial hit (and possibly penalties/consequential losses too).

So we seem to be in a situation where the missing wall ties could have been left out of publicly funded schools too as the issue was with the private builder (as big_n_daft says, HM govt doesn't employ any brickies). The PFI contract seems to be doing what it should and shifting the financial risk off the taxpayer and onto the PFI company.

The SNP now want to terminate the contract that is doing its job and put the schools in public ownership (which would have no effect on the construction issue). But who will they get to build new facilities if private companies can't be trusted? PFI is about financing and operation, not about construction.

Having seen a few of these go up, they basically build and snag a whole school in the summer holidays so it seems entirely possible that a few corners were cut (consciously or not) in order to meet a tight deadline. That there were latent defects as a consequence isn't really that surprising.

But who will they get to build new facilities if private companies can't be trusted?

The local authority building control should have inspected the building at various stages of the project as should the architect if he was employed to do so but it is not possible for them to oversee everything that happens on site. A level of competence should be expected of contractors and they have a duty to employ and manage equally competent subcontractors. In my experience it is increasingly difficult to find people with expert knowledge and skills in the construction industry and that's without adding the fact that they need to be 'the right price' too. We completed a job recently with a contractor whom our public body client ended up thinking were a complete disaster but I have no doubt that they'd employ them again in a heartbeat if they returned the lowest tender. 😥

The race to the bottom on price is driven by the buyer setting the rules that way, they need to base their criteria on quality issues as well.

Blaming the winner of a race when the rules are rules are set in a particular way is nonsensical

There are lots of reasons to not like PFI but this really isn't one of them.

In this instance the rectification will be the responsibility of the operating company, and in all likelihood will have fairly stringent penalties applied on top of that due to unavailability of the sites.

The architect and design team should be given a damn good going over too. There are lots and lots of external people who get paid handsomely to look after the govt/LA's interests, design, PM, sign the works off etc. They always seem to get away scot(!) free.

mrhoppy - Member

In this instance the rectification will be the responsibility of the operating company, and in all likelihood will have fairly stringent penalties applied on top of that due to unavailability of the sites.

Which is all fine but doesn't change the fact that we have walls falling off schools. It could have been a baby robin's face... As it is, it's "just" massive disruption for school kids, many of whom start their exams in 2 weeks. Money doesn't fix that.

I wonder how many folks here would defend a thief by saying "Yeah but the police should have stopped them and the owner should have had better locks"

I wonder how many folks here would defend a thief by saying "Yeah but the police should have stopped them and the owner should have had better locks"

Not really a useful analogy as I'd be very surprised if anyone set out to deliberately build a shoddy building. The whole thing needs a proper RCA done, I don't think us folk on the internet can tell why the failure to design/build properly occurred and why it was signed off. Sounds possibly like a load of failures along the line. Key thing is now to learn from it and not make the same mistakes again.

Surely the authorities in Scotland should be looking at all buildings constructed by the builder + their subcontractors?
This size of project would have only been a small part of their order book.

It's likely lots of people are walking past or working in buildings they've built.

Carlisle's Cumberland infirmary was built as PFI and now has a catalogue of issues associated its fire separation and non compliance with building control. Two NHS trusts are refusing to take over the hospital