After chancellor Rishi Sunak’s recent Budget promised new funding for education which would see schools’ resources “restored to 2010 levels” over the next three years, Marish Academy Trust executive headteacher, Gill Denham, questions whether this will truly translate into extra money for schools.
The Budget pledged an additional £4.7 billion for schools by 2024/25, a cash increase per child of £1,500, and a further £2 billion of funds for education recovery from the pandemic.
However, the BBC reports that the new funding will not cover the nine per cent cut in education spending since 2009. Notably, it also falls short of the funding demands made by education unions and Education Endowment Foundation boss, Sir Kevan Collins, who said that around £15 billion would be required.
Furthermore, the new funding will be expected to cover any wage increase for teachers, after the public sector pay freeze was axed. Indeed, national funding has already had to account for the increase in teachers’ pensions and the teachers’ pay grant.
Taking this into account, Geoff Barton of the Association of School and College Leaders has warned that school and college budgets remain stretched amid what remains a difficult financial situation.
These difficulties have been laid bare within the two primary schools of the Marish Academy Trust, situated in Slough, Berkshire.
Speaking to The Leaders Council, Gill Denham, the Trust’s executive head, explained that while promises of extra funding were welcome, it should not be taken for granted that additional funding will equate to added resources for schools.
“It is good to hear there is more money being made available for schools, but the devil is always in the detail,” Denham said.
“I am trying hard to find the detail online but can only find vague comments that schools will be funded at 2010 levels in real terms. The question now is what this really means for schools like us.
“In the current academic year for instance, my two primary schools in Slough are approximately £30,000 short of what we had in our funding last year, despite endless promises to the contrary. This is because the teachers' pension and pay grant has now been subsumed into the national funding formula and the same is likely to happen with any salary hike for teachers.”
At a time where schools and communities are still reeling from the effects of Covid, Denham has branded the financial state of schools unacceptable.
“It is wholly unacceptable that we have lost any funding this year, especially so given the impact of the pandemic on our community and the specific issues in Slough in relation to redundancies from Heathrow and the deprivation of our families. The reality, however, is that we have.
“I’d like to trust Rishi Sunak, I really would. But my question to him and to this government is this: ‘what does an extra £2.2 billion for schools actually mean in practice for the likes of us?’.”
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