Education Minister Erica Stanford says a review of school property projects is "absolutely not" a cost cutting exercise.

Education Minister Erica Stanford says the government has inherited a system "bordering on crisis" .

The Ministry of Education identified up to 350 projects "where expectations far exceeded what could be delivered" and has already paused 20 building projects, Stanford says.

Some projects were weeks away from shovels in the ground, but "funding available hadn't been managed well enough to meet what schools understood had been approved", she says.

The principal of a school in Bay of Plenty warns that halting partially completed building projects might end up costing more money than would be saved.

Pāpāmoa College is one of 20 schools with builds already put on hold, and principal Iva Ropati told Morning Report schools are being blindsided by a political shift.

The school has a $60 million building project under way and the last two blocks, to cost $20m, are on hold.

Ropati says the school has a well-managed project but is "caught up" in this inquiry.

"We've increased our roll by 50 to 100 a year its not going to be too far away before we're in some serious strife unless we have the space to deliver our curriculum.

"If the ministry is saying they're going to re-scope again in April once the inquiry's done they are without doubt going to be up for more money as those costs increase."

Former Education Minister Jan Tinetti said the government was "manufacturing a crisis". Photo: RNZ/ Angus Dreaver.

Former Education Minister Jan Tinetti says the government is "manufacturing a crisis" in order to reprioritise funding and the review is not justified.

Labour had doubled the budget on school property over its term, having itself inherited a system "bordering on crisis", she told Morning Report.

Tinetti says the ministry's approach is already to move away from bespoke building and towards modular buildings, and projects on hand are "not gold-plated". Where costs are increasing, the ministry will re-scope over the time of the projects, she says.

Stanford says the review of school property projects is "absolutely not" a cost cutting exercise.

The Ministry of Education has not been asked to save money and the government will be prioritising school property through the budget process.

The government will be putting more money into building classrooms every year.

There is pipeline of projects which are over-engineered, have extensive landscaping or are bespoke design, Stanford says.

The uptake of modular design "hasn't been rolled out at scale, by the ministry's own admission".

"The question for Labour is did they get good value for taxpayers' money over the last six years and deliver as many classrooms they could for the money they were spending."

-RNZ.