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Hundreds of bids for repair work to tackle fire safety and failing heating systems in schools have missed out on government funding, figures obtained by ����Vlog reveal.

Freedom of Information data shows 304 unsuccessful applications for fire safety projects in the 2025-26 Condition Improvement Fund (CIF) round.

The CIF provides capital funding for the , which smaller academy trusts and voluntary aided bodies can bid for.

A further 323 “mechanical systems” projects, including work on heating and boilers, failed to secure funding, as well as 292 building structure projects and 206 roofing schemes, the figures from the Department for Education reveal.

Of the 2,525 project bids in the most recent CIF round, 1,712 were rejected, meaning nearly seven in 10 were unsuccessful overall.

The scale and nature of the rejected bids demonstrate the extent of unmet need for repairs across the school estate, leaders warn, with schools requiring repairs being “pitted against one another” for limited funding.

And estate experts say the figures could understate the scale of the problems with buildings because schools are already forced to prioritise their most urgent repairs when bidding.

Schools ‘in desperate need of repair’

Pepe Di’Iasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said it is “abundantly clear” that capital funding is insufficient to maintain the school estate.

“Many schools are in the very difficult position of being unable to move forward with projects that would secure the long-term safety and sustainability of the site because the funding just is not there,” he said.

Although schools can be rejected for a variety of reasons, “the sheer number of unsuccessful critical infrastructure projects demonstrates a major issue with capacity”, Mr Di’Iasio added.

“Put simply, schools that are in desperate need of repair are being pitted against one another, and many are missing out.”

Paul Whiteman, general secretary of the NAHT school leaders’ union, said the number and range of unsuccessful applications showed CIF was “failing to cover some absolutely fundamental building needs”.

The CIF will be replaced by autumn 2028, the DfE announced earlier this year. The new programme will allow schools to access maintenance funding without submitting a full bid.

The government has not provided further details on how the new funding will be allocated, but schools will be required to collect granular, timely data on their estates and share it with the DfE to receive the capital.

Mr Whiteman welcomed plans to replace CIF with an allocation-based funding model, but warned that changing how money was distributed would “only go so far” without sufficient investment.

In 2025 the National Audit Office estimated that £13.8 billion would be needed to restore school buildings in England to at least a satisfactory condition.

Leaders forced to pick ‘strongest’ bids

Tim Warneford, a school estates consultant, said the rejection figures are particularly significant because fire safety is among the types of work most likely to score highly in the CIF process due to the potential risk to life.

Meanwhile, mechanical and electrical failures could force schools to close, he said.

Mr Warneford said he had seen examples of primary schools where ageing heating systems meant they had only a single working boiler, leaving them facing the prospect of emergency boiler hire if it failed during winter.

“This is the perfect barometer or illustration of what’s going on out there,” he said.

Funding pressures mean schools are already having to be strategic about which projects they submit for funding, he added.

Where a school faces several problems, such as the presence of asbestos alongside fire safety concerns or a failing heating system, it would select what it thought represented its “strongest hand”, he said.

No specific reason for rejection

The DfE told ����Vlog it does not record a specific “reason for rejection” for unsuccessful CIF applications.

Each application is independently assessed and scored before projects are ranked, with funding allocated from the highest-scoring bids until the available funding runs out, it said.

The DfE refused to disclose the names of unsuccessful schools, saying that doing so could deter parents from sending their children to schools known to have condition problems.

Parents could also incorrectly conclude that unsuccessful schools had managed their applications poorly, the DfE added.

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