School Funding

Stephen Timms Excerpts

Wednesday 25th January 2017 Commons Chamber

[Justine Greening]

I do agree. We want every child to have the same chance to do as well as possible no matter where they grow up in our country or, indeed, where they start from academically. That is why we must ensure that the resources going into the system reflect our high ambitions for every child wherever they grow up, and that they are distributed to that effect. It is because of this Government’s economic policy, which has seen jobs, growth and the careful management of public finances, that we have been able to protect the core schools budget in real terms over the course of this Parliament. In fact, our core schools investment is the largest on record.

[Stephen Timms (East Ham) (Lab)]

David Cameron promised that the funding per pupil would be protected but, as we have heard, that is not happening. In my constituency, funding per pupil is being reduced further as a result of the formula. Why is David Cameron’s promise being broken?

[Justine Greening]

It is not. We are protecting funding per pupil as well. On apportioning funding fairly between schools, we know that it is time to look at the school funding formula to ensure that we rectify the current unfair and outdated system, as my right hon. Friend the Member for Wokingham (John Redwood) set out. At the moment, funding is not distributed evenly across our country and does not take account of pupil needs. For example, a school in Sutton receives £75 in extra funding for each pupil with English as a second language, but in Tower Hamlets that figure is £3,548. We know that a primary school pupil who is eligible for free school meals and who has English as an additional language attracts £4,219 in East Sussex, but just down the road in Brighton and Hove, that same child would attract £5,813 for their school. We know that a secondary class of 30 children with no additional needs attracts £112,100 of funding in Staffordshire, but £122,500 of funding in Stoke-on-Trent. That is a difference of £10,400 for one class.

We know that parents and families see that unfairness playing out for their children, and it is simply untenable to say that these historical imbalances and differences in how we fund our children across the country are something that we should accept. No parent should have to put up with such disparity. I hear the shadow Secretary of State say that she does not like our proposed funding formula, but it is subject to consultation. I have actually extended the consultation period from 12 weeks, which was the longest period ever for such a consultation, to 14 weeks, because this is complicated. It is important that we have a measured, proportionate debate around the right way to proceed with the funding formula. What is absent from Opposition Members’ speeches is any suggestion of a better way of doing things. When the shadow Minister wraps up the debate, I will be interested to hear whether Labour has any alternative to the national funding formula—or any other education policy for that matter. We are right to be taking action.

--- Later in debate ---

[Neil Coyle]

Absolutely, especially in London.

My constituency is even more badly affected than the borough of Southwark. On the Department’s statistics, my schools will lose £1,050 per child per year. They are the worst affected schools anywhere in country, but the Government have claimed that this is fair. There are 35 schools in my constituency, of which the ones losing out are Alfred Salter, Globe Academy, Walworth Academy, Bacon’s College, Boutcher, Charlotte Sharman, City of London Academy, Cobourg, Compass, Crampton, English Martyrs, Friars, Harris Academy, Notre Dame, Peter Hills, Redriff, Riverside, Robert Browning, all three St Joseph’s, Snowsfields, Southwark Park, St George’s, St John’s Catholic, St Jude’s, St Michael’s, St John’s Walworth, St Paul’s, St Saviour’s and St Olave’s, Cathedral, Surrey Square, Tower Bridge, Townsend and Victory. If anyone was keeping a tally, they will know that that was a list of 35 schools. Every single school in my constituency will lose out, and not one school will benefit, under the Government’s proposals.

[Stephen Timms]

Does my hon. Friend agree that if the proposal of the Chair of the Education Committee to remove the 3% protection were implemented, the position for schools in his constituency and many others would be a great deal worse?

[Neil Coyle]

I completely agree.

The cuts proposed by the Government have led parents to get in touch with me to say, “What is it about Southwark children this Government do not like?” Why is my constituency being targeted for cuts? These cuts will impede the progress that schools have made, prevent them from managing the challenges they face and damage the prospects of the children and families I serve, but whom this Government are failing.

Of course, the Department’s figures do not include costs that schools cannot ignore: pension contributions, the apprenticeship levy and higher national insurance contributions. The National Audit Office figures suggest that the borough of Southwark will lose £12.5 million by 2018-19 and that schools in my constituency alone will lose £6.9 million.

If Ministers push forward with these plans, they will fail schools, fail teachers and fail families and children, and the Secretary of State will undermine parents’ aspirations for their children, undermine future opportunities for Southwark children and undermine the prospects for this country overall. The Government must rethink this blatant attack on opportunity and stand by their manifesto commitment.

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[James Berry]

I ask the hon. Lady to come and repeat that in the poorer parts of my constituency, where some people are just as deprived as those in Tower Hamlets. In addition, a high proportion of children receive the pupil premium. I do not disagree that deprivation should be one of the most important factors or that schools in boroughs such as Kingston will always get less because deprivation is a key factor, but that level of disparity is simply not fair. There will be winners and losers whenever a funding formula is reorganised unless there is a massive increase in funding to level things up rather than down, but no party committed to such funding in its manifesto.

[Stephen Timms]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[James Berry]

No, I will not.

Headteachers make the legitimate point that the increased costs of the national living wage, and national insurance and pension contributions, are putting pressure on their budgets. The situation is the same in other areas of the public sector, but we should not forget that point in this debate.

Finally, high-needs funding, not the national funding formula, is the biggest issue in my constituency. Such funding has resulted in an overspend on the dedicated schools grant of some £5 million, which will have to be found from school budgets as a whole. The council and free school providers have put in two applications for new special schools in the borough—one in Kingston and one in Richmond—which will reduce pressure in the medium term, but there is no clear answer to where that £5 million will come from in the short term, apart from every single child’s school funding. I am pleased that the Minister was able to meet the council leader and me a few weeks ago to discuss that.

All the points that I have made must be taken into account in addition to the funding formula. I am pleased that Kingston schools will receive a small increase. We could have been bolder and made bigger reductions elsewhere to make the situation even fairer to pupils in my constituency, but there must be fairness across the board, as my constituents recognise. I will be submitting a response to phase 2 of the consultation, just as I did previously, and it will be informed by my constituency’s headteachers—the best headteachers in the land.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alison McGovern (Wirral South) (Lab)]

I pay tribute to the shadow Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Ashton-under-Lyne (Angela Rayner), who made a brilliant speech. She demonstrated, as has the fact that a large number of Members wanted to speak in this debate, that education truly matters in our country.

I will make a few brief points. The first is that the narrative of this discussion is completely wrong. It is a typical Tory divide-and-rule strategy. I do not believe that schools that might gain from a change in the funding formula want to do so at the expense of other children, teachers and schools. For example, I know that the folks who are set to gain from the changes in Knowsley, just across the River Mersey from where I live, do not want to do so at the expense of children and schools in Liverpool, Sefton and Wirral. We should not be dividing people, but bringing them together.

Schools in Wirral are set to lose hundreds of pounds per pupil. That plays into another classic Tory narrative, which is that people do not need money to get anywhere in life or to help in education. The hon. and learned Member for South East Cambridgeshire (Lucy Frazer) said that money is not sufficient to drive achievement. In fact, money may not be a sufficient condition, but it is a necessary one, as all the evidence shows. I am next to my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Stephen Twigg), who led the London Challenge. I know he would say that it was reform and improvement, alongside decent funding, that resulted in those achievements under the last Labour Government that we are all proud of.

[Stephen Timms]

Will my hon. Friend join me in welcoming one element of the funding formula, which is the inclusion for the first time of a mobility factor to reflect the additional costs of high pupil turnover? However, does she agree that it ought to be larger than the 0.1% of the total that is being allocated on that basis at the moment?

[Alison McGovern]

I have never disagreed with my right hon. Friend yet and I do not now.

As a Member of Parliament, I am afraid of very little, but I still get nervous when I have to go and see local headteachers. I want to give the final words of my speech over to those headteachers. To begin with, Mark Whitehill, who is head of Gayton Primary School in Heswall, spoke this simple truth:

“If Education really is a priority, we need the staff to help us deliver it!”

Another brilliant head in my area, Catherine Kelly, agrees with that. She said that her job is about life chances, but colleagues whom she respects as fantastic educationists are talking about leaving the profession because, as heads, they are not focusing on the right things as they are having to balance the books and make ends meet. She said that they are

“invariably being set up to fail”.

She is frugal and knows that if the school is overstaffed, it is a waste of the students’ resources, so she would never make that happen. She says she is afraid that the Government “clearly doesn’t understand education”, which I believe is true.

The last word goes to David Hazeldine, a great head from Wirral, who says:

“The fundamental issue is that there is not enough money in the system. Teacher recruitment shortages and massive underfunding are placing children’s education and well-being at risk.”

He says that that is “creating a perfect storm”.

Those three heads have put it better than I ever could. I ask the Secretary of State to learn the lessons of schools in her own constituency and recognise that although money is not all that schools need, they cannot do without it if they want to give kids a chance.