Pupils at Sacred Heart Catholic school in Barrow-in-Furness are in temporary classrooms and education is suffering

• Revealed: 1.5m children in England studying in unfit school buildings

Tinsel glistens through the window of the darkened classroom. But the decorations are not from this Christmas, or last. A whiteboard marks the date when pupils and staff were evacuated in a hurry from Sacred Heart Catholic primary school nearly two years ago.

It was 16 January 2023 when a routine inspection found that the floor of the 95-year-old school building was rotten and could collapse any moment. Children would have plunged into the rat-infested cellar below.