Prime Minister Rishi Sunak appeared on BBC Radio Tees this morning (September 28) and was grilled on hospitals, schools and the cost of living crisis - here's everything that happened on the show.

Radio Tees presenter Amy Oakden was joined by Richmond MP and Prime Minister Rishi Sunak live from Downing Street this morning as part of a round of local radio interviews.

Sunak had first appeared on the nearby BBC Radio York before joining Radio Tees just after 8.30am this morning for a 10 minute segment.

Read more: Protest planned over RAAC disruption at St Leonard's School in Durham

On the agenda was "local things for local people", Oakden affirmed as she played a voicemail from Mel Wise from Richmond, a woman on a mission to raise £18,000 for new computers at Leyburn Primary School.

The teacher stated the team had been having "sleepless nights" as they aimed to raise funds through bake sales and fairs to offer children access to technology.

"Why are schools struggling to provide this equipment?", the host added.

"I care passionately about our children's education. One of the most important things I can do is make sure we have a world-class education system to set our kids up for the future", Mr Sunak said.

Then, laying out "the facts" of school funding, Mr Sunak argued the £60bn funding in education provides the "highest ever level" of investment per pupil.

He added: "On a per-pupil basis, there is more money going into our schools than there ever has been in history."

Ms Oakden said "this still isn't enough", pushing the Prime Minister. who doubled back on the funding as well as tutoring, claiming that the programme has allowed children to "catch up" on learning they lost during the pandemic.

Continuing the theme of education and schooling, the Raac concrete was brought up  just days after parents and students staged a protest at St Leonard's School in County Durham.

Pupils at the Catholic school have been severely impacted by the crisis and are still facing online lessons or are made to sit in corridors rather than in classrooms.

Mr Sunak said: "I know how enormously frustrating the timing of this Raac situation was, but when the Government received new information, new advice about the risk posed by Raac in schools specifically, it was right that we took action.

"Of course the timing was frustrating, but the worst thing to have done would have been to sit on that and wait and put our kids at risk.

"What I can say is we’re working as quickly as possible providing the funding to schools, to get the surveys done to help them put mitigations in place so we can get all our kids back and face-to-face education as quickly as possible."

Speaking about St Leonard’s in particular, Mr Sunak said it was on the Government’s list to be rebuilt and a feasibility study was almost complete, with the procurement, design and planning happening before the end of the year.

The conversation of Raac then moved to hospitals, with Ms Oakden stating the University Hospital of North Tees has been described as "not fit for purpose", and is a "bit like a war zone".

This prompted Mr Sunak to say that the hospitals with the most "serious" issues with Raac have been earmarked and placed into what he called the 'New Hospital Rebuilding Programme'.

The James Cook University Hospital was then brought to the fore, with the Prime Minister using the facility as an example that the government is "investing in healthcare across the North East", recieving £10m funding.

Mr Sunak then pointed out that the James Cook is "near (his) house," which prompted some raised eyebrows on social media as Northallerton, near weher Mr Sunak lives, is acually some 30 to 40 minutes drive away from the hospital, in Middlesbrough.

Finally, there was time for a quick discussion of poverty levels in the region, with Ms Oakden stating that two in five children in the North East are growing up in poverty, equating to nearly half of children in Middlesbrough.

She asked: "How do you plan to tackle that?"

Mr Sunak said: "The most important thing we can do to ensure children don’t grow up in poverty is to ensure that their parents are in work.

"I am pleased that since 2010 we have got several hundred thousand children growing up in workless households as a result of everything we have done for the economy and supporting people in to work."

However, the Prime Minister's words were not recieved well by children's charities who have since criticised the figures mentioned in the segment.

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Reacting to the Prime Minister's words, Action for Children’s director of policy and campaigns, Imran Hussain, said: "There are more children living in poverty in the UK now than there were in 2010 on the headline measure of relative poverty.

"In 2010-11, there were 3.6m children in poverty. The latest figure (2021-22) is 4.2m.

"You can’t ‘level up’ the country if you’re sweeping under the carpet the big rises in child poverty clearly shown by the official figures. The longer we’re in denial about the scale of the problem, the harder it will be to fix it.’

"We’ve had David Cameron’s ‘Life Chances’, Theresa May’s ‘Burning Injustices’, Boris Johnson’s ‘levelling up’ agenda – but we’re still waiting for a child poverty strategy that will make life more bearable for desperate families and give their children a safe and happy childhood."