We’ve just been speaking to Labour’s shadow justice secretary Steve Reed, who has accused ministers of “neglect” and “incompetence” as over 150 schools across the UK are set to partially or fully close just days before the start of the new academic year.

“It’s shocking,” he said, and added that parents will be “furious” that they are finding out “just days before the start of term” that their child’s school will have to close.

After school strikes and the COVID lockdowns, he said this is “yet another problem facing their children’s education”.

He blamed the “incompetence and the neglect of government ministers”.

Asked about schools minister Nick Gibb’s claim that this is happening so late because new information has just come to light and they’ve taken immediate action, Mr Reed said: “I think they’re being a little less than frank, to put it politely.”

He said a school collapsed in Gravesend in Kent on a weekend five years ago due to this type of concrete, and added: “You can’t think of a starker about the danger and risks this concrete poses.”

Mr Reed said Labour’s shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson has raised this issue over 150 times in parliament, and added: “If they’re telling you they didn’t know this was a problem, they’re not being truthful.”

As a result, he accused ministers of “neglect” and “incompetence”, and added: “There is no way a competent government would have allowed a situation to develop where days before the start of term, they’re telling parents there’s no school for their kids to go to because they’re not safe.”

He called on ministers to publish the full list of schools and other public buildings affected so we can see the true scale of the problem.