Forum Brief: School funding crisis

Charles Clarke has accused local education authorities of causing a funding crisis by failing to award schools all the money they have been allocated.

The education secretary said the government will publish local authority accounts which would justify his charge.

Forum Response: Association of Teachers and Lecturers

Gwen Evans, joint acting general secretary, told ePolitix.com: " The government has two options: to continue to try to blame LEAs and to threaten to cut them out of the equation or to come to terms with the unpalatable truth that there never was enough money in the first place.

"In recent years they have devolved money to schools in an effort to make it look as if schools are not cash starved; but the consequence has all too often been that services (particularly for special educational needs) have been more costly to supply because economies of scale have been lost.

"There is no point in arguing about who has grabbed the cake crumbs when the cake was too small for the party in the first place."

Forum Response: Local Government Association

Sir Jeremy Beecham, chairman of the Local Government Association, said: "In his speech to the NASUWT conference today, Charles Clarke acknowledged that the figures for the speculated funding shortfall need to be 'checked and rechecked'.

"What we do know, however, is that this year local councils are spending £100 million more than the government has allocated on their local schools, so claims that in general councils are underfunding and holding back money provided by central government are unfounded.

Indeed 25 per cent of the money spent on schools is raised locally, by council tax. Councils are demonstrating their commitment to education by increasing council tax in many areas to fund additional support for schools.

"A major change in the funding system introduced this year has caused considerable turbulence both in schools and local education authorities.

"It is vital that councils maintain their strategic role in local education provision. It is councils, working locally with schools, who can assess and provide for the different needs of, for example, an isolated rural school and an inner city school with many pupils facing social deprivation.

"Whitehall cannot possibly understand the individual needs of every school in the country.

"Also, it has not been widely reported that there are areas in England and Wales where some schools are reporting budget shortfalls, while other schools hold balances in reserve. These are reserves that the LEA does not control, and amount to £1.2 billion.

"Over the past ten years local councils have, in total, spent £4.3 billion above the government's own provision on education. Perhaps it's time to recognise the fact that we need to see more money in education system.

"The LGA will be looking at the government's figures, we will be looking at what local councils are doing and we will also look at the local formula, which are currently driven too much by pupil numbers rather than pupil need."