To ask the Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families what plans his Department has to introduce pre-completion testing for acoustic conditions in schools that are required to comply with Building Bulletin 93. (263442)

Building Bulletin 93 Acoustic Design of Schools states:

“To ensure that the performance standards are met, it is recommended that the client should include a requirement for acoustic testing in the building contract”.

Testing is not however required for compliance with Part E of the Building Regulations.

For Building Schools for the Future Projects, Partnerships for Schools have included a clause in their Facilities and Services Output Specification, November 2008¹ which is currently out for consultation. This states:

“The contractor will complete a set of calculations to indicate compliance with BB93. Testing and remediation will be carried out to prove compliance.”

In the current review of Building Bulletin 93, we are considering the possibility of strengthening the recommendation that all schools should be subjected to pre-completion testing.

¹ The PfS Facilities and Services Output Specification can be downloaded from:

http://www.partnershipsforschools.org.uk,/library/bsf_standard_docs.jsp#OutputSpecification