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Press Release

Statement on Ed Balls and education spending cuts

21 September 2009

Commenting on media interviews with Ed Balls about the schools secretary's suggestions for cuts to education spending, Philip Parkin, general secretary of Voice: the union for education professionals, said: "At the moment all the main parties seem to be trying to out-compete each other with their 'my cuts are bigger and better than yours'. This is an issue which deserves serious discussion and consultation rather headline-grabbing soundbites.

"It remains to be seen if this is just party conference hype or if the government will actually be able to draw up concrete plans, for consultation with the unions and others, on how to make savings without cutting front-line services - or even if it will be re-elected in order to implement them.

"I would be happy to have the opportunity to discuss Ed Balls's proposals with him, although I suspect that my list of areas in which spending could be cut would be significantly different to his.

"I would certainly be looking to remove expensive layers of bureaucracy and central control rather than trying to reduce the number of head teachers.

"We have known for many years that the success of a school is very dependent on the quality of its leadership. We need to be growing more quality leaders not trying to spread wider and more thinly those that we already have."



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Voice: the union for education professionals

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