Politics

School cuts campaign is back as unions warn of £2bn shortfall

Move attempts to put school funding higher up new PM's in-tray, with analysis suggesting shortfall equates to 38k fewer teachers

Move attempts to put school funding higher up new PM's in-tray, with analysis suggesting shortfall equates to 38k fewer teachers

A campaign which saw education funding become one of the most important issues at the 2017 election is being relaunched as schools face a £2 billion budget shortfall.

The relaunch of the school cuts campaign website also comes amid warnings that 90 per cent of schools will run out of money next year as reserves dry up amid soaring prices.

School funding is supposed to rise in cash terms in the coming years, but inflation and soaring energy bills mean these increases are worth less than when they were announced.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies warned earlier this year that the government would not meet its promise to restore school budgets to 2010 levels, with budgets set to be 3 per cent lower in real-terms by 2024. This amounts to a £2 billion shortfall.

In a joint letter to Conservative MPs, 13 education associations warn the desperate situation “will become even worse should further cuts be imposed by the Treasury”.

The letter is signed by education unions NAHT, ASCL, the NEU, NASUWT and Community, and support staff unions the GMB, Unison and Unite.

It is also signed by the National Governance Association, Confederation of School Trusts, Sixth Form Colleges Association, Association of Colleges and Parentkind.

Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has signalled a new era of austerity. Announcing several U-turns on Truss’s original tax-slashing mini-budget, he said “some areas of spending will need to be cut”.

The campaign comes as former chancellor Rishi Sunak is set to become prime minister this week after Boris Johnson dropped out of the race.

If his sole challenger Penny Mordaunt fails to achieve 100 nominations from MPs by this afternoon, Sunak will be anointed without a contest.

Schools face cuts of £250k

In their letter, the associations warned MPs an average primary school in their constituency faced a £35,000 to £45,000 shortfall, equivalent to two support staff or one teacher.

An average secondary would be £200,000 to £250,000 short, which is equivalent to around four to five teachers.

Overall, a £2 billion shortfall is equivalent to around 38,000 teachers.

“A funding shortfall of this scale cannot be absorbed by schools and colleges without severely impacting the quality of education,” the associations wrote.

cuts
Sunak

“Put simply, they will not be able to afford to continue to provide the education that pupils and students deserve.

They warned that schools and colleges serving the most deprived communities “are
likely to be hit hardest from funding challenges, at a time when the achievement gap between poor pupils and their more affluent peers has hit a ten-year high”.

Parts of the school estate are now in a “dangerous state of repair”, they added. But it would take another 400 years at the current rebuilding pace to repair all schools, the letter warned.

Leaders and governors now face making “heart-wrenching choices”, including making staff redundant, increasing class sizes, reducing subject choices and cutting extra-curricular and catch-up provision.

Support for vulnerable learners and attendance also face the chop.

Action needed to ‘avert a crisis’

“This is a crucial opportunity to avert a crisis which will otherwise have a devastating impact on children and young people, who are already suffering the after-effects of the disruption to
education as a result of the pandemic,” the letter stated.

The school cuts website was launched in 2016 by a group of education unions in response to real-terms cuts to school budgets.

The website, which is still running but has not been updated since last year, allows anyone to look up the funding implications for their local school.

The campaign was ramped up in the run-up to the 2017 general election, in which education became the third biggest issue for voters, behind only Brexit and health. The Conservatives ended up losing their majority.

A poll after the election suggested 750,000 changed their vote because of concerns about school funding.

The relaunch of the campaign will not be welcomed by Conservative MPs, some of whom have been vocal in their criticism of the website.

The website was criticised in 2019 by the UK Statistics Authority which concluded a claim that 91 per cent of schools were facing funding cuts gave a “misleading impression”.

Meanwhile, the Institute for Fiscal Studies warned that the most deprived fifth of schools had seen the smallest increase in funding under the government’s national funding formula since 2017.

The formula was supposed to address historic regional variations in school funding, but the f40, a campaign representing local authorities with traditionally lower funding, still have concerns.

They have written to Kit Malthouse, the education secretary, to demand a meeting about the “unfairness of funding, along with the need for increased funding in education and the crisis in SEND”.

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