Schools: Funding

Lord Storey Excerpts

Thursday 21st July 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

The Secretary of State’s overriding consideration is to ensure that the reform is right and has the benefits of proper consultation. The change is too important to rush and, personally, I think her decision shows a great strength of mind. She has considered the matter carefully and decided that we do not want to put schools through the uncertainty, when they come back in September, of not knowing what their budget is to be for 2017-18. That conclusion shows great sensitivity for the issues facing our schools and teachers. As for the point about whether there will be any political bias in our considerations, I can assure the noble Lord that there will not be.

[Lord Storey (LD)]

I thank the Minister for making the Statement. As the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, rightly perceived, it is made against a background of cuts in funding in schools. He mentioned 5% but there are suggestions that with teacher cost caps, teacher pensions, national insurance and other on-costs such as wages, it will be nearer to 12% than 5%. On these Benches, while we welcome a fair funding regime, we agree with the Minister that you have to move carefully and cautiously. I was delighted to hear him talk about consultation, which is really important, but in any national scheme there will be winners and losers. We have serious concerns about the plan to cut the pupil funding by up to 1.5%. I have a direct question for the Minister: can he guarantee that the pupil premium funding will also be protected in real terms?

[Lord Nash]

I can answer that question. We have committed to protect pupil premium funding through to 2020.