The petition of residents of Craven Ward,
Declares that the cuts in spending to school budgets in Craven Ward, in the constituency of Keighley and Ilkley, will lead to further staff redundancies, increasing class sizes, reductions in the range of subjects on offer and a decline in educational standards.
The petitioners therefore request that the House of Commons urges the Government to reverse the cuts that have been made to school budgets in Craven; further to protect per pupil funding in real terms in the schools of Craven over the lifetime of this Parliament; and further to ensure no school loses out in real terms as a result of any new funding formula.
And the petitioners remain, etc.—[Presented by John Grogan, Official Report, 14 March 2018; Vol. 638, c. 6P.]
[P002120]
Observations from the Secretary of State for Education (Damian Hinds):
Last year, we announced the details of the national funding formula for schools which is supported by significant extra investment of £1.3 billion across 2018-19 and 2019-20, over and above the budget announced at the 2015 spending review. School funding is at record levels, with core funding for schools and high needs rising from almost £41 billion in 2017-18 to £42.4 billion this year and £43.5 billion in 2019-20.
The need for reform has been widely recognised because of the manifest unfairness in the previous system. Given the significance of this reform, we undertook wide-ranging consultations which allowed us to hear from, and carefully consider, over 26,000 individual respondents and representative organisations.
Supported by our significant additional investment, the national funding formula will also:
Recognise the challenges of the very lowest funded schools, by introducing a minimum per pupil funding level. Under the national funding formula, in 2019-20 all secondary schools will attract at least £4,800 per pupil, and all primary schools will attract at least £3,500 per pupil. In 2018-19, as a step towards these minimum funding levels, secondary schools are attracting at least £4,600, and primary schools £3,300.
Allocate every local authority more money for every pupil in every school in 2018-19 and 2019-20. Final decisions on local distribution will be taken by local authorities, but under the national funding formula every school is attracting at least 0.5% more per pupil in 2018-19, and 1 % more in 2019-20, compared to its baseline.
Provide a £110,000 lump sum for every school, and for the smallest, most remote schools, distribute a further £26 million through dedicated sparsity funding.
Full details on the notional allocations for local authorities and schools can be found here: https://www. gov.uk/government/publications/national-funding-formula-tables-for-schools-and-high-needs. These include notional school level allocations showing what each school would attract through the formula.
As a result of these changes, under the final national funding formula, schools in the Keighley constituency would gain 2.1% if the formula were fully implemented (based on 2017-18 data). Bradford schools will continue to have higher per pupil funding than the national average under the national funding formula, as the formula allocates additional funding to schools with many additional needs pupils to help those who have fallen behind their peers. Therefore, this higher than average funding reflects the high proportion of pupils with additional needs (such as deprivation, low prior attainment, English as an additional language, etc) in Bradford schools.
The previous Secretary of State set out in her statement to Parliament in July 2017 that, to provide stability for schools through the transition to the national funding formula, local authorities will continue to set their own local formulae which will determine individual schools’ budgets in their areas, in 2018-19 and 2019-20, in consultation with local schools.