School Funding

Debate between Liz Twist and Steve Double

Monday 4th March 2019 Westminster Hall

[Liz Twist]

I certainly agree with my hon. Friend.

[Steve Double (St Austell and Newquay) (Con)]

Will the hon. Lady give way?

[Liz Twist]

I will make some progress, so that the debate makes some sense.

As I said, this is a speech of two parts. The first part is about the facts and figures and the second part is about what they mean for our schools—the staff, the governors, the parents and, most of all, the pupils.

--- Later in debate ---

[Liz Twist]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend’s assessment of the situation. That is a real problem, as it is for Mr Ramanandi and schools in Gateshead.

As I was saying, the Minister must know that schools face real-terms cuts year on year. It is simply not right to say that funding per pupil, which is the measure that really matters, has gone up. The Government’s statistics show that England’s schools have 137,000 more pupils in the system. The respected Institute for Fiscal Studies acknowledges that schools have suffered an 8% real-terms reduction in spending per pupil, despite growing numbers of pupils coming through the door.

With increasing numbers of pupils, and decreasing funding in real terms, schools have had to make cuts that have resulted in 5,400 fewer teachers, 2,800 fewer teaching assistants, 1,400 fewer support staff and 1,200 fewer auxiliary staff. If funding per pupil had been maintained in value since 2015, school funding in England would be £5.1 billion higher than it is now.

Like the petitioners, school leaders across England are concerned that the Government have not kept their promise to increase school funding in cash terms this year. The Secretary of State for Education promised that

“all schools would see a modest rise in funding”.

However, 4,819 schools have not received the Education Secretary’s guaranteed cash increase, meaning that one in four primary schools and one in six secondary schools have had their funding cut in cash terms this year. Locally, 71 schools in Gateshead have suffered Government cuts to per-pupil funding since 2015, losing out on £14 million. In my constituency, the average cut is about £45,000 per primary school and £185,000 per secondary school.

Headteachers in my constituency tell me that, as funding has become tighter, schools have had to cut back on essential resources: teaching and non-teaching staff; support staff who work with vulnerable pupils; small group work; interventions with children who are not thriving; teaching resources; subject choices; classroom and extracurricular activities; repairs for buildings, including asbestos management; and renewal of equipment.

Unison, which represents support staff in many of our schools, forecast that over the next year one in four schools across Gateshead borough will see redundancies. We know that, on top of that, many schools are not replacing staff who leave, so the reality is much worse for them.

Support staff are disproportionately affected by the redundancies. These are mostly part-time or term-time-only jobs, low-paid and generally taken by women living close to the school. By 2021, all but three schools in Gateshead are expected to be in budget deficit, so it is likely that further redundancies are on the horizon. How do we expect our schools to plan for the future?

[Steve Double]

I am very grateful to the hon. Lady and fellow member of the Petitions Committee for giving way, and she is making an excellent start and making the case for more funding for schools. I am sure that there is no one in this Chamber today who does not want to see more funding for schools. However, schools in Cornwall have been making the sorts of rationalisations and working efficiently in the way that she is describing for many years. So while we make the case for more funding for our schools, does she agree that the allocation of that funding must be fairly distributed across the country, because metropolitan schools have had too big a share of the cake for far too long?

[Liz Twist]

I will repeat the point a third time that the petitioners have been clear with me that their concern is that all schools are properly funded, wherever they are, so I will not enter into those discussions.